


Tear Into Your Soul

by nirejseki, robininthelabyrinth (nirejseki)



Category: Naruto
Genre: Asphyxiation, Bondage, Brainwashing, Cock Warming, Consensual Underage Sex, Dark!Hashirama, Dubious Consent, Dubious Morality, Emotional Manipulation, First Time, Forced Orgasm, Grooming, Hair-pulling, Humiliation, Kidnapping, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Masturbation, Multi, Mutual Masturbation, Obsessive Behavior, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Overstimulation, Ownership, Pet Play, Possessive Behavior, Praise Kink, Spanking, Subspace, Tentacles, psychopath Hashirama, various povs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-07-23
Packaged: 2019-11-29 11:46:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 9
Words: 42,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18222737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nirejseki/pseuds/nirejseki, https://archiveofourown.org/users/nirejseki/pseuds/robininthelabyrinth
Summary: Hashirama is the best of brothers and the best of friends, and he's going to show Tobirama and Madara just how much they mean to him.By force, if necessary.(no one is ever leaving him again)





	1. Training Week 1

**Author's Note:**

> For blackberreh-art, previously posted on my tumblr. Open to suggestions for future chapters

“You’re doing so well, Madara,” Hashirama says, loving how Madara’s back shudders with pleasure every time he says it. “You’re doing so _good_ ; I knew you were the right one to help me with this.”

He means it, too, cheerful and forthright with his emotions and his love; the way he means everything he says. Madara calls him guileless, naïve, overly trusting, foolishly optimistic, and Hashirama supposes he is, but he doesn’t see those things as bad things the way Madara does.

Though it occurs to him that Madara might not say those things anymore, after this.

Hashirama dismisses the thought as quickly as it comes.

Sure, Madara had been – a little perturbed, yes, to find himself bound by the Mokuton, roots twining through his fingers and around his tongue to keep him from using jutsu to escape, roots around his arms and legs and hips to keep him still, and a thick one around his neck as a precaution. And maybe he’d been a little irritated at how Hashirama had had to cut away his clothing, even though he’d taken such efforts to make the cuts right along the seams so that it’d be easier to sew back together later. And, certainly, he’d thrashed under Hashirama’s hands when he’d cleaned him with a nice warm wet towel, especially when he’d reached the intimate places…

But honestly, what was Hashirama supposed to do?

The Uchiha are such prudes, after all; Madara would never have agreed from the start. He wouldn’t have even considered it.

What a shame that would have been: look at how he’s enjoying it now, his hips arching helplessly, his face flushed red with pleasure, his tongue pressed against the root in his mouth as if seeking to pass along a kiss, his eyes wide and desperately flickering Sharingan-red.

Hashirama can’t blame him for trying to memorize the scene: Tobirama does looks so very sweet on his knees.

Hashirama is distantly aware, in some part of his mind, that most brothers wouldn’t care to know such details, how there’s a flush painting Tobirama’s white cheeks as red as his eyes, how his legs have widened just a fraction from how he’s started in an effort to get some relief from the pressure between them – how serious he looks, even with his lips wrapped around Madara’s cock and his jaw no doubt getting tired, how determined to complete his task.

Perfect.

Honestly, all those other brothers were clearly just falling down in their brotherly duties.

Hashirama has and always will take the very best care of Tobirama.

Just like he is now.

“Try using your tongue a little more, Tobirama,” he advises. “Just because you’ve figured out how to take him deeper doesn’t mean you should forget about the basics.”

Tobirama doesn’t do anything as crass as nodding, but he applies himself well, if Madara’s muffled groan is anything to go by.

Tobirama was always such a good student.

“Wonderful,” Hashirama praises. His father, for all his attempts to mold Tobirama into a mindless sword in his image, never figured out that Tobirama responds better to praise than to sternness, and Hashirama has never had any problem exploiting his brother’s weakness. “Wonderfully done, both of you. Isn’t he good, Madara? And on his very first try, too.”

He reaches out and runs his fingers through his brother’s hair, petting him the way he would a cat.

Madara makes a strangled noise.

He probably wants to come, Hashriama concludes. Perhaps it was a little cruel of Hashirama to wrap a root around the base of his cock, keeping him trapped on the edge the way he has been, but this isn’t _about_ Madara, not really.

Madara’s just helping Hashirama out.

That’s what best friends do, after all, and they’re best friends, best friends forever. They always were, even when the war lay between them – Hashirama is sure that Madara felt the same despair at the circumstances, even if he didn’t always show it on his face or in his voice – and now they were working on that village they’d always dreamed of, together, and it was perfectly reasonable that Hashirama ask Madara for a favor now and again.

And, of course, who else could he trust this all-important task to, if not his best friend?

Only Madara knows what Tobirama means to him. Hashirama’s little brother, his last little brother. Infinitely precious, deserving of only the best.

It’s not Tobirama’s fault that he’s not good with people, after all. He never has been, not from the start; always a quiet child, needs drowned out by Hashirama’s rambunctiousness, quiet and too serious, never quite able to understand jokes that were too abstract, and Hashirama would swear that he’d almost been relieved when their father had instructed him never to meet anyone’s eyes because the Senju couldn’t afford to get used to looking at red eyes.

And now that Tobirama was getting older, well, it just wasn’t healthy for him to stay locked away in his labs or his office, slaving away over new jutsu or figuring out yet another form that should probably be filled out if the village is going to be administratively manageable.

Poor, virginal Tobirama.

Left to his own devices, he’d never figure any of it out, and sex is far too enjoyable for Tobirama to just dismiss out of hand as a ‘people’ thing that was too difficult to attempt. He barely even made time to touch himself, as Hashirama, who’d insisted on sharing a bedroom with Tobirama since the day he’d lost Madara on the riverbank in a desperate attempt not to lose track of anyone else he loved, is all too aware.

No, clearly what Tobirama needed was a chance to learn properly – to try and fail, without being judged, and to enjoy the pleasures of succeeding.

Hashirama basks in the feeling of knowing, in his heart, that he’s a wonderful brother.

And a wonderful friend, too, however much Madara may had protested at the start. He’s seen the way Madara watches his brother sometimes, out of the corner of his eyes when he thinks no one’s paying attention.

Yes, Hashirama thinks to himself, this is perfect. The trees were right, when they told him it was time for Tobirama to learn to flower.

(They’re not always right. _Crush your enemies_ , they told him, _drink their water steal their nutrients block their sunlight strangle them as saplings so that they will never grow to challenge you. Their bodies are nothing but fertilizer to the growth of your own power._ But humans are more complicated than that, Hashirama knows, even if their bodies do make surprisingly good fertilizer when they start too-seriously resisting what he’s trying to achieve in the village. Humans need more than the merciless iron fist of natural competition; they need hope, too, and love, and Hashirama has always been so very full of love to share.)

His hand is still in Tobirama’s hair, feeling him move up and down, growing ever more confident as he does.  They’re doing so well, both of them, Madara for giving his body to this purpose and Tobirama for learning it, and Hashirama doesn’t hesitate to tell them both that, to applaud them, to make them glow in happiness that only he can give them, happiness he longs to give them all the time.

Maybe, he thinks happily to himself, this will be the first step to peace between them, peace between his precious people the way he has brought peace to his village.

He ignores the fact that he had to kidnap Madara and lie to Tobirama, who would have surely objected if he knew that Madara hadn’t volunteered of his own free will the way Hashirama had told him he had, implying that the roots were just some sort of kinky game they liked to play, presenting the whole thing as if it was so obviously normal that no normal person would question it, and poor Tobirama who didn’t know people for anything other than fighting hadn’t known enough to find the gaps in the argument, even if he’d been suspicious and reluctant to participate for rather a long time.

(He gave in at the end, that’s what’s important. Tobirama always gives in to what Hashirama wants, in the end, and that’s how Hashirama always knows that he’s doing the right thing because surely, _surely_ , if what he was doing was really wrong, Tobirama would hold stubbornly fast the way he does with new jutsu or, more annoyingly, brand new forms that always seem to require Hokage-level review.)

“How do you feel you’re doing, Tobirama?” Hashirama asks, solicitous as ever. “You think you’ve got the hang of it now? Should we let him come?”

Madara frantically nods his head.

Tobirama considers the issue – serious as always, Hashirama’s little brother is, serious and hard-working and always willing to push his training longer than anyone else – but eventually his fingers twist in an affirmative sign.

“Good choice,” Hashirama praises. “I’m so glad you’re being considerate, Tobirama, I know it’s not always your first instinct.”

Tobirama flushes a little extra in embarrassment, Hashirama thinks, but what? It’s true.

Besides, Hashirama likes humiliating his younger brother once in a while, and he thinks he can teach Tobirama to like it, too.

“All right,” Hashirama says. “I’m going to let him go now, and that means he’s going to come. Now, while I want you to learn to swallow – it’s cleaner that way, and I know you like to be clean – in this instance,  don’t worry if you end up pulling your head back; the feeling is something you get used to. But in case you do, I want you to keep your eyes closed. Okay?”

Tobirama gives it a decent try, all told: he swallows some, lips moving prettily, but then he gags and pulls back, come spilling onto his chin, and Madara finishes instead on his pretty red-flushed face.

“Well done,” Hashirama says. “Both of you! You did so well! I’m so proud of you both.”

Tobirama looks up at him, still on his knees, Hashirama’s hand still in his hair, and when he sees that Hashirama means it, he smiles, that tiny little twitch of the lips that means that he’s happy that he’s done a job well and pleased Hashirama.

“Now, we’re not done yet –” Hashirama ignores Madara’s strangled squawk, because that’s just Madara being a drama queen as always; seriously, why did he think that Hashirama had asked him to make sure he had the week free before coming to meet him? “– but I think we should give Madara some time to recover, don’t you?”

“Anija, we really shouldn’t be neglecting the village for so long like this,” Tobirama says. Such a good, dutiful little brother, though sometimes he really is something of a killjoy.

“Honestly, Tobirama, it’s like you don’t trust me,” Hashirama says mournfully, ignoring Tobirama’s pointed stare that suggests that in matters of paperwork, he really doesn’t. “I arranged coverage for all three of us and told everyone that we were on a super-secret-level mission.”

“S-rank,” Tobirama grumbles. He’d invented the new ranking system a month ago and he’s been on everybody’s case to start using it ever since. “They’re called S-rank. And something like this certainly doesn’t deserve to be –”

Hashirama rolls his eyes and moves his foot forward until its between Tobirama’s legs, pressing against his cock, and Tobirama makes a strangled sound, almost as if he’s surprised by the feelings his own body is generating, and grinds forward involuntarily against Hashirama’s leg.

“You don’t really want to go back to all that paperwork,” Hashirama tells him, because he’s a good brother that knows what’s best for Tobirama. “Come on, Tobirama; you’ve only barely just learned how to suck someone off – you don’t want to leave your lessons _unfinished_ , do you?”

Tobirama, ever the orderly and sometimes compulsive completionist, scowls at the thought.

Hashirama isn’t above using his brother’s quirks against him.

“Now, we can’t move onto fucking until Madara’s feeling better,” Hashirama continues briskly, ignoring the way Madara’s eyes go wide in favor of noting how his cock gave something of what was probably a painful twitch of interest. “But that doesn’t mean there’s nothing we can do. Take off the rest of your clothing, Tobirama.”

Tobirama clutches as what’s left of his outfit, however disarrayed. He’s too obedient to actually ask ‘do I have to?’, but Hashirama can see the plaintive question in his gaze.

“At least get your cock free,” Hashirama compromises. They could work on getting Tobirama comfortable with full nudity around Madara later.

(It’s like Tobirama thinks Hashirama hasn’t noticed how he uses his sensor abilities to make sure he’s never in the onsen at the same time Madara is, and all because he’s worried about how Madara will react if he sees that one stretched-out scar on his chest, the Uchiha fan crudely drawn into much younger flesh with a kunai – the signature of Tajima’s child-killing squads, though that one had never managed to complete their work, what with Tobirama accidentally using his too-powerful suiton to explode their mostly-composed-of-water-eyes right out of their skulls in an act of unintentional eye-stealing he’d regarded as an abominable disgrace ever since. Tobirama thinks Madara will lose his temper, and Hashirama’s not entirely sure he’s wrong about that, though he’s always thought Madara was far more likely to be angry on toddler-aged Tobirama’s behalf instead of his blinded clansmen.)

The next step takes some maneuvering on Hashirama’s part, mostly to get them both into proper position, but between the roots around Madara’s body and Tobirama’s habitual obedience it’s only a few minutes before Tobirama is curled around Madara’s back, his cock sliding between Madara’s clenched thighs, and making wonderful little whimpering sounds as he does.

Hashirama settles himself down to watch, his hand finally sliding down to wrap around himself the way he’s been wanting to from the beginning. He’s been holding off, knowing that Tobirama needs guidance, but this is easy enough for Tobirama to manage on his own, and Hashirama needs to make sure he won’t lose control of himself (or Madara) when the two of them start fucking.

Lessons first, he reminds himself; audience participation later.

“Hashirama –”

He looks up, blinking in surprise; that was Madara’s voice. Oh, oops, he must have pulled the root away from Madara’s tongue to use it to stabilize his head against Tobirama’s thrusts; he hadn’t meant to do that. But Madara’s all breathy and from this angle Hashirama can see him getting hard again already, so surely he’s not about to protest _now_.

Still, he tightens the root around Madara’s throat, threatening his airflow, just in case Madara gets it into his head to say something distressing.

Not that Madara seems to object to that.

“You realize,” Madara grunts, his eyes boring straight into Hashirama’s even as Tobirama’s hands clench against his arms to steady himself, “that this isn’t normal, right?”

Hashirama feels his hand move faster on his cock without his say-so, which is bad of him – this is for them, for Tobirama and Madara, not for him – but, well, a totally virtuous life never seemed like that much fun.

“Tobirama’s a virgin, if you couldn’t tell already,” he tells Madara, ignoring the way that Tobirama mutters a muffled curse into Madara’s shoulder, his face burning with embarrassment. “I’m just being a good brother and helping him figure this out.”

“That,” Madara says through gritted teeth, “is that _not normal_ part.”

His eyes suggest that the whole kidnapping business has also not been forgotten.

(Hashirama’s hand moves faster at that, too. He likes Madara like this, tied up in Hashirama’s Mokuton, because this way he can’t go, he can’t leave, he can’t pick his family over Hashirama _again_ ; this time all the choices have been taken away from him and given to Hashirama, who’s so much better at making these choices for him, for Tobirama, for everyone. Hashirama wants peace, yes, peace in his village and in his country, but for all of the infrastructure and democratic trappings Tobirama is working on building, the village is, at its heart, a dictatorship. And the village, just like Tobirama, just like Madara, is _his_.)

“Just let him get it out of his system,” Tobirama says in Madara’s ear, panting hard in a way that suggests he’s not going to last much longer. “You can’t stop in the middle - he just gets like this sometimes, it’s fine.”

“It’s _fine_?!”

“It’s a Mokuton thing, I think,” Tobirama says, because that’s the excuse Hashirama has always given him for, well, just about everything, and it usually works. There’s some advantage to being the only Mokuton user in the clan; he can blame it for _anything_ and no one knows well enough to call him out on it. “He gets these stupid ideas into his head sometimes and won’t give up on them. And besides, this is somehow still less embarrassing than that time he decided to teach me to jerk off. He went on for _hours_.”

Madara makes a groaning sound, but Hashirama’s pretty sure it’s not because of the physical sensations this time. Apparently Madara likes the mental image of that, Hashirama teaching Tobirama how to pleasure himself – and honestly, Hashirama should have thought of that to begin with, the Uchiha being as visual-minded as they are.

Maybe he should bring in a mirror. Let them see what a beautiful sight they make.

A good thought.

“He’s probably going to want to tattoo you, too,” Tobirama adds.

Madara tries to twist around at that, but Hashirama holds him tight with the Mokuton and doesn’t let him. “He wants to _what_ now?” he demands, the promise of Uchiha fire in his voice.

“He never grew out of the period in his life when he wanted to write his name on everything he thinks of as his,” Tobirama explains, managing to sound a little long-suffering even through the overwhelming lust and need that fills his voice. “I just barely managed to convince him to put mine on the bottom of my foot so not everyone can see it, even in the onsen.”

Hashirama had originally been planning something right over Tobirama’s heart, so that his little brother remembered who he belonged to first and foremost, but he’d been charmed by the idea of Tobirama having his name on his foot like he was one of Touka’s dolls, pliant and ready to be played with whenever Hashirama feels like.

Hashirama likes playing with Tobirama.

He likes playing with Madara, too.

“And you _let_ him?” Madara demands.

“He’s my anija,” Tobirama says, confused, as if that’s the only answer he needs – and it is. Hashirama’s taught him well over the years, gave him everything he could, and it would take a lot more than Madara’s questioning to make Tobirama doubt the purity of Hashirama’s affections.

Well.

Purity might not be the right word, given the context.

“It’s just to remind Tobirama that he’s mine,” Hashirama explains to Madara. “It’ll be the same for you. And don’t look at me like that; it’s just a little tattoo! It won’t hurt that badly. You’ve had much worse.”

“It’s not the pain I’m objecting to!”

Uchihas. So unnecessarily stubborn.

Still, there are ways of making his point.

Hashirama lets his chakra fill the room, powerful and overwhelming and almost suffocating the way he knows it can be – more powerful than Madara’s ever seen before, because Hashirama’s never used his full power against him on the battlefield and Madara knows that, just as he’d never used everything he has against Hashirama, too.

“You’re _mine_ ,” Hashirama tells his precious people, a blazing beacon of sunlight to their finely tuned senses. Sensors, both of them, even though Tobirama is the stronger; both of them made vulnerable by their own abilities to the strength of Hashirama’s emotions when he aims it straight at them both, overpowering their ability to think or refuse with the affection he feels for them both, the joy he has at seeing them happy, the love that fills his heart. “Both of you. I love you both so much.”

Tobirama makes a choked little cry and comes between Madara’s thighs, and judging by the dumbstruck look on Madara’s face he’d be doing the same if he had the slightest bit more stimulation.

Hashirama meets Madara’s gaze, even though he knows it opens him up to a genjutsu – not that Madara is in any condition to be doing anything like that.

“I only want what’s best for you,” he says kindly, because Hashirama is kind, above all else. It’s who he is. Maybe he doesn’t show his kindness the way other people do, through the occasional well-meaning murder and kidnapping, but then, he is a shinobi; no one should have expected him to be any other way. “Just trust me, and I’ll take care of you. Trust me, and say you’ll be mine. _Say it_.”

He comes at the sound of Madara’s strangled _yes_.

Hashirama is the best of brothers and the best of friends.

He’ll even, out of the kindness and love in his heart, give them a few minutes to recover before introducing Tobirama to the delights of getting fucked. Maybe he’ll even let them skip ahead to having Tobirama learn to take both of them at once; Hashirama does so want for the people he loves the most to learn to share, going forward, and it’s good to start impressing the importance of that early on.

Hashirama smiles, and plans.


	2. Training Week 2

Tobirama probably thinks he won a great victory, convincing Hashirama to let him keep on one layer as they proceeded to the next lesson, Hashirama thinks fondly.   
  
Nothing could be further from the truth, of course. Far from preserving Tobirama’s modesty, leaving on the simple yukata (and nothing else) left him looking more indecent than ever: the lower end pooled in his lap, doing nothing to hide how hard he was, draping over his hips almost as if it was designed to highlight how long his pale legs were, how thick and muscular his thighs. Belted tightly at the waist, it was old enough to have been worn practically translucent, and Tobirama’s sweat made it cling to his skin even as it gaped open at the neck to expose the long line of his collarbone.   
  
Best of all, Hashirama was able to trade the ‘concession’ of letting Tobirama keep it on in return for his compliance in other ways: an agreement to do just as Hashirama says, no matter how embarrassing, and even not protesting Hashirama’s use of the Mokuton on him, allowing the little roots to twine around his thighs to pull them open, and creeping up his sides and across his chest - doing nothing yet, but available should Hashirama feel the need to interfere.  
  
And Madara claims Hashirama doesn’t know how to negotiate.  
  
“Don’t I have the cutest brother?” Hashirama asks Madara, who looks like he’s been hit by a particularly well aimed genjustu. That might be because Tobirama is currently working his cock in both hands, but honestly he’s had that expression ever since Hashirama made Tobirama crawl across the floor to climb into his lap. “He’s so shy and adorable.”  
  
Tobirama flushes so nicely when he’s humiliated - his face goes nearly as red as his cock.  
  
Perfect.

“Now, there’s no reason to be nervous,” Hashirama says, and slides himself in right behind Tobirama, wrapping his arms around his brother and putting his chin on his shoulder. He knows exactly the sort of picture they make, him still fully dressed with a blushing Tobirama in his arms, one of the only people who can make his brother seems small, but even if he didn’t, he would’ve guessed it when Madara makes some strangled noise that sounds halfway between a prayer and a curse. And he doesn’t even have an excuse of a root in his mouth to excuse his mumbling. Madara’s always had a bit of a crush on Hashirama as well, and now that Madara belongs to him, Hashirama’s going to make all his dreams come true. “This is going to be fun.”

Tobirama looks a little doubtful, but it’s fine; Hashirama has definitely convinced him of stranger things than this.

He drops his hands onto Tobirama’s thighs, pushing them a little further apart and pushing him forward, until his brother is pressed between him and Madara both.

“Next lesson,” Hashirama says with a grin. “Fucking. It’s a little more complicated, so I’ll be helping out with this one.”

“Hashirama!” Madara hisses, his eyes wide. “It’s his _first time_ , you _can’t_ –”

Hashirama exerts the tiniest bit of will, tightening the root around Madara’s neck and cutting off his air.

Madara thrashes, causing Tobirama to gasp as he bucks up into him, the force causing his cock to push against Tobirama’s. Madara’s lips form a curse.

“If you don’t have anything helpful to say, Madara,” Hashirama scolds, though in a loving tone. He adores Madara, but really, there’s no cause to jump the gun. “Then don’t say it.”

He releases him, and Madara chokes on the air he sucks back into his lungs.

“That made him start dripping,” Tobirama observes, looking down at his hands with interest. “I wouldn’t have thought it’d do that.”

Hashirama settles a hand around Tobirama’s neck, giving it a gentle squeeze – not enough to cut off air the way he had Madara, but enough to remind Tobirama that he had the strength in that one hand to snap his neck if he wanted.

“Maybe I’ll show you,” he says, only half-teasing, watching Madara’s eyes go round at the casual display of power. “If you’re very good for me, I’ll even make sure you like it.”

“I – can be good,” Tobirama says, gnawing a little at his lower lip.

Curiosity has always been his vice of choice.

“I know,” Hashirama says, pressing a kiss to his cheek and removing his hand, dropping it back down to his thigh. “And you are. But you’re also a tactile learner –”

Madara makes a slight choking sound at that, no root around his neck required.

“– so I’m going to show you what to do next. Your job is to do to Madara what I do to you.”

Tobirama nods, clearly comforted by the simple instruction – much of shinobi training is of the ‘do as I do’ school, so he can lie to himself that this is just another exercise like that – and then hisses when Hashirama’s hands slide up his sides under his clothing. He obediently copies the gesture onto Madara, whose hands Hashirama pulls onto Tobirama’s thighs to replace his own.

There’s definitely a bit of extra stroking involved that isn’t Mokuton-driven, though, Hashirama is pleased to notice, even though it stops the second Madara sees that he’s noticed. Still, it’s about time Madara started taking some of the initiative, even though he’s currently still pretending to himself that he’s here under pressure.

Okay, kidnapping, so maybe he is a bit, but that’s fine. Hashirama can make him forget all about that.

Madara’s not going to leave him _ever again_.

None of Hashirama’s precious people will ever want to leave him.

Hashirama’s going to make _sure_ of that.

His fingers slide up to Tobirama’s nipples, tweaking them gently, causing Tobirama to cry out in surprise, even as his hips jerk forward and his cock twitches.

A touch of Mokuton, and Madara’s left hand is firmly wrapped around Tobirama’s cock, stroking just gently enough that it isn’t enough to push him over the edge.

Tobirama is panting, his eyes gone wide and a little mindless at the two pleasurable sensations at once, so Hashirama tsks in his ear. “Remember to copy,” he reminds him, and Tobirama nods. His gestures are much sloppier already, and he forgets for a moment that he’s supposed to copy Hashirama, not Madara, making Hashirama laugh and press his lips on the side of Tobirama’s neck where he knows he’s sensitive.

“Anija,” Tobirama whimpers. “Stop that; I can’t _think_ –”

“Copy me,” Hashirama says mercilessly.

Tobirama leans forward to press his own lips onto Madara’s neck, then cries out again when Hashirama licks a line down the side, timing it to match perfectly with his hands on Tobirama’s chest and Madara’s hands on his cock.

Tobirama tries to keep up, but Hashirama’s got experience and four hands on his side, and it’s not hard at all to drive Tobirama entirely out of his mind. Throwing in an extra bit of Mokuton at that point, the little roots he’s wrapped around Tobirama tightening on his thighs and hips and curling onto his chest to leave Hashirama’s hands free to explore other parts of Tobirama’s body – well, that’s probably just cheating.

But then, they call Hashirama the god of shinobi, not the god of _playing fair_.

It’s nice to see Tobirama so lost in pleasure, desperately trying to replicate what he can of all those overwhelming sensations onto an enraptured Madara and failing miserably, his head lolling back onto Hashirama’s shoulder as he whimpers and whines.

And they haven’t even started the real fun yet.

Tobirama’s far past the point of listening already, so it’s up to Hashirama to take the oil and slick up one of Madara’s hands, meeting a helpless Madara’s gaze over Tobirama’s shoulder as he does, then using the Mokuton to guide it down to hover between Tobirama’s legs.

He doesn’t do anything else, though, just goes back to tormenting Tobirama.

Tobirama, who’s started making demands in the most delightful drunken voice for something, anything, more – something he knows he needs, but doesn’t know what –

It would take a stronger man than Madara to hold out against that forever, and he breaks, shaking off his stubborn refusal to actively participate in favor of pushing two fingers into Tobirama.

“Yes – oh – yes, that, please, more of that – I need more –”

It takes only a little bit of prompting in Tobirama’s ear before Hashirama’s proud younger brother starts begging in earnest for Madara’s cock.

“Don’t I have the cutest brother?” Hashirama asks again, watching Madara’s face now, eyes lidded with pleasure as he watches Tobirama fall apart between them, riding Madara’s fingers like he was born to take them. “What do you think, Madara?”

“Beautiful,” Madara breathes.

“He’s being so good for us,” Hashirama purrs. “So good, so obedient…don’t you think he deserves a kiss, Madara? I don’t think he’s had one of those before.”

Madara’s eyes go wide at that, as Hashirama expected they would, and he uses his free hand to catch Tobirama’s red-flushed face and pull it close to him.

“Would you like me to kiss you?” he asks, their lips close enough for Tobirama to feel the air behind the question.

Hashirama hides his face by nibbling at Tobirama’s neck, thinking gleefully to himself that Madara has always been a sap, to ask such questions, but also that he really did pick the right person for this.

(This is why everyone should let Hashirama make all of their decisions for them.)

“Please,” Tobirama breathes back. Hashirama’s not sure Tobirama even knows what he’s asking for, at this point, but it’s clearly enough for Madara, who pulls him close and kisses him properly.

Tobirama’s eyes flutter closed, moaning against Madara’s lips, and it’s a long few seconds before Madara pulls away, Sharingan spinning in his eyes as he burns this moment into his mind forever.

Hashirama can see the exact moment when those red eyes finish running over Tobirama’s face and drop down casually to scan the rest of the body, only to go still in horror at the sight of that crude but still entirely recognizable fan carved into Tobirama’s chest like so much meat.

Madara knows what a scar like that means.

Maybe it was a little cruel of Hashirama to use their first kiss as a distraction to push Tobirama’s yukata open without his noticing, but, well, he wouldn’t be a Senju if he didn’t know how to best press an advantage against a Sharingan user, even if his goals are a little different than the usual.

Tobirama frowns a little when he feels Madara stop moving entirely, a stillness Hashirama deliberately echoes, and opens his eyes.

He sees where Madara’s eyes are focused at once.

His hand automatically flies up to try to pull clothing over it, but the gesture is futile and he knows it; once the Sharingan catches sight of something, there’s no erasing it.

“The child-killers,” Madara says. His voice is blank, though something heavy lurks in its depths, something Tobirama will not be able to recognize but which Hashirama knows is the hatred Madara has always had for that policy, which he blames for the deaths-in-revenge of two of his brothers. “They caught you.”

His hand falls down from Tobirama’s face to rest over the mark. His thumb traces over the shape, misshapen now – pulled apart by age as Tobirama grew older and larger.

“I –” Tobirama starts, then stops, clearly unsure of what to say.

“Is this why you hate us?” Madara asks. His eyes are no longer red, but they’re just as intense, focusing fiercely on Tobirama’s face even as Tobirama averts his gaze. “You’re always so stern…is this the reason?”

Actually, Tobirama is stern to everyone – it’s just his way to be well-meaning but communicate it terribly; the man could (and has) made the delivery of a perfectly innocent birthday present sound like a threat of slow death by poison – but Hashirama’s not planning on clarifying.

Not when things are working out so well.

Not when he knows what Tobirama will say in response.

“No. The fault is mine,” Tobirama says, his gaze still averted.

Madara’s eyes narrow. “What does that mean?”

“I know it’s no excuse,” Tobirama says. “But – I knew only one jutsu at the time. Water-summoning. Not even a bullet, nothing offensive, just pulling. There wasn’t water nearby, but I thought I could maybe use some blood to throw into their paths, if they were injured. They weren’t. I – it was an accident. Their eyes – the water – I didn’t mean to. I overcharged the jutsu.”

“…are you trying to _apologize_ to me?” Madara asks, and his voice has dropped low, guttural. Enraged. “For surviving the child-killers?”

Tobirama grits his teeth. “The Senju don’t steal eyes,” he says, with what dignity he can manage. “Dojutsu or not. That’s what makes us honorable enemies to your clan, rather than – bandits. If…if you’d prefer not to help me any further, I understand; I will explain it to anija, if he doesn’t.”

“Help…?” Madara’s eyes are red again, this time with fury. Hashirama so very carefully phrased all of this exercise as some sort of favor Madara is doing for them both; it’s clear enough what Tobirama means. “You think I won’t want to touch you because you blinded some _child-killers_?”

“I –”

Madara’s on him before Tobirama can finish the sentence, kissing him brutally and fingering him open with a brand new fervor, and it’s less than a heartbeat before Tobirama’s already thrashing in mindless, overwhelming physical pleasure again, this time accompanied by relief of a terrible emotional burden being lifted.

Perfect.

Hashirama grins where neither of them can see him – they’ve forgotten he exists, really, Madara using his body as little more than a convenient wall to press Tobirama up against. Normally he’d be peeved by this, planning a punishment for them for ignoring him so readily, but not now.

Not now, when Madara’s crooning meaningless phrases in Tobirama’s ear, compliments and admiration mixed in with promises of fidelity and pleasure beyond imagining, when he’s using his hands and his fingers to drive Tobirama wild, when he’s pulling out his fingers and replacing them with his cock.

Hashirama wouldn’t dare interrupt this _now_.

Not when things are working out just as he’d hoped.

Madara had to be the one to take Tobirama’s virginity, after all; him and him alone, and not in a way he could excuse by blaming Hashirama, either. His actions, his responsibility – _his_ lover, to protect and care for.

Uchiha possessiveness is as predictable as the sunrise.

(Madara is _never_ going to leave Hashirama again.)

Tobirama is taking Madara beautifully, too, his back arching as he clings to Madara’s arms, his legs pushed up high, his back pressed against Hashirama’s chest; he’s moaning like the highest paid whore at a brothel, pulling Madara towards him further, greedily demanding more, faster, harder, _yes_ , like that, just like that, keep doing that, forever –

Hashirama does so love it when a plan works out.

Though really, Madara should be more considerate of his poor virgin lover – he’s going far too quickly, using too much of his overwhelming physical power in his thrusts, egged on by his simmering fury and his overwhelming lust, and while Hashirama’s all in favor of Tobirama being able to feel this come morning, he doesn’t want Madara to actually hurt him.

Luckily, he never did remove that root around Madara’s throat.

He clenches his fist.

The root squeezes.

Madara chokes, his hands flying up to his throat, but his hips keep moving – albeit at a somewhat more sedate pace.

“Now, now,” Hashirama says mildly. “This is supposed to be a lesson, remember, Madara?”

Madara glares death.

“You shouldn’t make promises you can’t keep, what with all of that talk about keeping him forever,” Hashirama continues, widening his eyes innocently as he looks to the ceiling in thought. “Tobirama might want someone else, you know, now that he knows what to do. That nice ambassador from the Hyuuga’s been dropping some hints about sealing their alliance to the village with a marriage –”

_Never_ , Madara mouths, even as his fingers turn white scrabbling at the root around his neck and his eyes go blurry, though his hips never stop moving. The rivalry between the Hyuuga and the Uchiha over whose dojutsu is better is nearly as legendary as the endless infighting between Uchiha and Senju; Hashirama picked his goad well. _Over my dead body_.

Since Hashirama agrees, having said as much to the relevant ambassador along with a recommendation that he be very grateful to their incipient alliance lest he accidentally find himself impaled on a tree branch on his journey home – not that Hashirama would ever be so crude, of course, he’ll wait until the man is involved in a fight of some sort, maybe some bandits-mercenaries that could be hired through anonymous contract, and then use his roots to trip him at an inopportune moment – and also because he really does like Madara, he releases him.

“Madara,” Hashirama says, and Madara looks at him. “Take him apart.”

Madara isn’t much of a long-term strategist, despite his best attempts at it, but he’s always been marvelously task-oriented.  

Hashirama doesn’t have to do anything at all, just sit and watch and bask in his own brilliance.

Not that that’s going to stop him.

“You make such a pretty picture,” he sighs, putting his chin on Tobirama’s shoulder again. He’s anchored himself with chakra, making him unmoving even as Madara’s steady thrusts force Tobirama against him. “Both of you, my precious people – you’re so good for me, doing so well, being so beautiful…I wish I had the Sharingan, to keep this picture of you forever. Guess you’ll just have to do it for me again and again, just so I can keep seeing it.”

They were both moaning, now. It’s so convenient, both of them responding so well to praise – Hashirama wonders sometimes if it’s something to do with how they were all raised, child soldiers in the midst of war, or if he’d subconsciously trained Tobirama to respond to the same stimulus as Madara in order to cut down on inefficiencies.

He runs his hands over them both, smiling down at them: his precious people, _his_ ; if they didn’t know it yet, they would – he would burn the knowledge of his ownership into their bones if that’s what it took. He’d tattoo Madara’s foot, making them a matching set (perfect, both of them, perfect because they are his) and maybe more than that, if they need a further reminder.

Maybe he’d weave a tree branch, thin as a string, into the collars of their clothing and close off their air whenever he felt the urge to remind them – during a council meeting, perhaps, or when they’re nagging him about finishing his paperwork – it would be a collar they couldn’t escape from without losing their shirts, using their own sense of propriety against them. He could use it as a leash, never letting them escape his reach for as far as his chakra extended.

Or maybe he’d turn their own clothing against them, remind the cotton of its origins as a plant at his command and use it to force them to perform for his amusement the way he’d captured Madara here today, only more subtle. He’d like to see them on his desk in the Hokage’s office.

“We’re going to have so much fun,” he tells them earnestly. “This week, of course, but not just that. Now that you’re getting along, everything’s going to be so much better now.”

He slides his hands down Tobirama’s body – fully nude now, as he’d hoped, with the last of that shame gone.

“So much fun,” he repeats. Then, with a wicked smile, he slides a finger in alongside Madara’s cock, causing them both to cry out in surprise.

“Anija!”

“Hashirama!”

“What?” he asks, batting his eyelashes at them both. “I want to play too. It’s not fair for you to ignore me.”

“You – you won’t _fit_ –” Tobirama starts to protest, but Madara cuts him off.

“You should,” he says, and his eyes are glowing red again. “C’mon, Hashirama. Help me remind him where he belongs, so he’ll never leave –”

Such a change from his earlier position; clearly that Hyuuga taunt was working better than Hashirama had dared hope.

“I really should,” Hashirama says, pretending to think about it. He won’t, of course; it _is_ Tobirama’s first time – he needs to learn to adjust to one person before he can think about two. “After all, neither of you get to come until I do.”

That’s when they both realize that he’s worked his Mokuton between them both, a loose curl around the base of their cocks to keep them on the edge as long as Hashirama pleased, and they both start begging for release at once.

It’s amazing how it suddenly became incredibly urgent once they realized they weren’t allowed.

“It’s not fair,” he objects over their pleas. “What about me? You wouldn’t leave me behind.”

“Please, anija,” Tobirama begs as prettily as he ever has. “Please, just let me – you can be later – please – I’ll do _anything_ –”

Hashirama arches his eyebrows. “Anything?”

“Anything!”

“An intriguing suggestion. What about you, Madara? Same deal?”

Madara looks a little more hesitant, so Hashirama ripples the roots still wrapped around his body in pointed reminder.

“I could keep you going for hours, you know,” he says. “As long as I wanted. Maybe I’ll let Tobirama come, like the good boy he is, then use you myself – and keep you around for Tobirama to play with you again, after, like a good little puppet dancing on my strings –”

“Anything,” Madara cuts him off, his eyes gone a bit wild at the idea. “Fine, anything. Just – do it!”

Hashirama releases them, and smiles to hear them scream out garbled versions of his name in thankfulness as they come.

His precious people.

Tobirama’s practically unconscious, eyes staring vacantly at the ceiling; Madara’s not much better, collapsed like a limp rag doll, not even bothering to pull out.

Hashirama uses his Mokuton to help extract himself and goes to get some nice wet cloths to wipe them both down. They’re probably very tired, after all, and now that he’s gotten what he wanted, he’s satisfied.

Well.

Not _entirely_ satisfied.

He waits until they’re both stirring again, reason returning, to sit on the edge of the bed and smile beneficiently at them both.

“Now that you’re awake again,” he says kindly, relishing the fear that’s entering both their eyes, “let’s talk about that ‘anything’…”


	3. Training Week 3

Once, during training, Tobirama made a left when he should have made a right and ended up running straight into one of Hashirama’s trees head-first at full speed. He’d ended up flat on his back and staring up at the sky, watching the little explosions of light his eyes created in the sky above him and wondering vaguely if he could somehow turn how he was feeling – a numb sort of spinning, like he’d somehow managed to whirl his spirit like a top without moving his body – into an attack of some sort.

He’s pretty sure he’s not actually concussed at the moment, but the feeling is not entirely dissimilar.

Tobirama really hadn’t been expecting _this_ when Hashirama announced that they would both be taking a week off for training purposes. If anything, he’d suspected a plot to avoid work and tried to refuse, but Hashirama had _insisted_ – and as Tobirama has long since learned, when Hashirama really wants something, Hashirama gets it.

(Tobirama doesn’t remember a time he didn’t give in to Hashirama when he truly wanted something, a time when he wasn’t dazzled and overwhelmed by Hashirama’s merciless chakra and endless willpower, but it only make sense – even under the harshest circumstances and no matter the force required, plants will find water to support them; it’s no surprise that it should be just the same with Tobirama and his brother.)

No – Tobirama hadn’t expected this at all.

But – walking into the outpost to find Uchiha Madara stripped bare and covered in Hashirama’s signature combination of roots and vibes, that magnificent chakra of his just pouring out of him in boiling waves of energy, a bewildering mix of lust-rage-confusion-affection-killing intent, and before Tobirama could back away Hashirama was at his back, whispering in his ear that this was all for _him_ , that Madara had _agreed_ –

Tobirama barely put up a fight.

Though he’s starting to wonder if he should have, watching Madara pace a hole in the floor like a caged tiger.

He’d been like that since shortly after Hashirama left, called back to the village to deal with something sufficiently urgent that even he couldn’t refuse (though he’d grumbled something about making sure they knew he was not to be bothered after that, using what Tobirama privately calls his planning-a-rose-garden-on-somebody’s-corpse voice).

Tobirama immediately offered to go as well, of course, but Hashirama shut that down immediately, ordering him to stay put and relax.

“Madara can be in charge of continuing your lessons while I’m gone,” Hashirama said in a tone that suggested he would be very disappointed in them both if his wishes weren’t obeyed. “This won’t be more than a few hours – and it’ll give me time to get your surprise ready.”

The surprise being whatever it was they’d very foolishly promised him they’d do for him.

A matter of some serious concern, as Hashirama took such promises all too seriously, but Tobirama couldn’t even begin to imagine what his brother might ask that he wouldn’t already willingly give.

Ultimately, despite his half-hearted arguments that he would be needed if there was anything administrative to be done (because Hashirama was worthless when it came to filling out forms), Tobirama hadn’t objected to staying too much, being at the time both languidly post-coital and inclined to blush at the thought of what Madara had taught him already, and what more there might be.

Madara hadn’t said anything at the time, his chakra still and deep with sated pleasure, but once Hashirama had left –

Well.

Tobirama might not have much experience with lovers, but even he can figure out that opting to furiously storm around a room, occasionally slamming a hand against a door, instead of proposing a second round isn’t exactly a good sign.

Normally, watching Madara is one of Tobirama’s favorite pastimes. The man’s chakra is truly breathtaking – most sensors of Tobirama’s acquaintance go for the cliché and compare it to fire, standard Uchiha, but Tobirama, with his suiton affinity, has always been more reminded of the metallic vapors that rise from the boiling depths of a hot spring, sharp and ashy and endlessly complex.

(He’d once laid the sharpest edge of his sword on his tongue, heavy and dangerous and refined with the blood and sweat of hard labor, and that was the closest he’d ever come to replicating the feeling that Madara gives off so easily.)

But right now –

Right now, it’s making his stomach sink.

“There’s no point in trying any of the exits,” he finally says, watching Madara put a palm against one of the windows this time. “This place was meant to withstand a siege.”

A siege of Uchiha, technically, given that it’s a Senju outpost, albeit one whose purpose was rendered moot several generations ago when the land around it became unquestionably theirs.

Tobirama had designed the seals Madara was struggling with himself, in fact. He had been here many times before: this was the usual place Hashirama locked him into to keep him safe while Hashirama suffered the black rages of springtime, the season’s savage battle for dominion of the forest rendering his brother more dangerous and less human than ever, the amoral fury of the flora given animal freedom, and Tobirama had used the opportunity to experiment with warding seals in a place that wouldn’t actually put any of their front lines at risk if and when they failed.

(Tobirama loves working with jutsus and seals – each action matched with a set of reactions that, if not predictable, are at least consistent, a trait he has always found lacking in other people.)

And Hashirama had been so _pleased_ with him when he’d made the ones that locked people in, as well as keeping them out…

Tobirama isn’t an idiot. He knew that he was giving Hashirama the keys to his own cage when he did it, but, ultimately, it doesn’t matter.

Tobirama would do anything to make his brother happy.

Besides, with Tobirama’s taste for solitude and distaste for other people ( _loud-confusing-not enough chakra-too many emotions-too facile faces and bodies-too many indicators to keep track of-too much_ ), allowing Hashirama a safe place to keep him when his fears overwhelmed his reason is not really so much of a sacrifice as all that, especially when Tobirama suspects he might’ve wanted the same for the younger brothers he lost almost before he’d really had a chance to get to know them.

(It’s natural for an older brother to want to protect the younger, Hashirama always assures him, an expression of their love; and Tobirama, who was always a little too strange for the taste of the rest of his family, has always clutched tightly to any sign of Hashirama’s affection the way a drowning man reaches for air, no matter how he sometimes wondered at Hashirama’s ways of expressing it. But he wondered less and less as time went on, grew more accepting, and reaped the benefit of his  compliance in Hashirama’s approval.)

“Does he do this sort of thing often?” Madara demands suddenly, interrupting Tobirama’s introspection. “This – taking – locking us in here with no way out – and then he – with _you_ – is there no custom or tradition or taboo Hashirama won’t trample over if it gets him what he wants?”

Tobirama blinks. What a strange question.

“Of course not,” he says. “Hashirama measures things by value; if tradition doesn’t serve him, he discards it. Or did you think he convinced our clan to make peace by _asking nicely_?”

Madara throws himself down into a seat, scowling fiercely, chakra flaring –

_a blacksmith thrusts the red-hot sword into the water and the roiling steam hisses forth_

“That’s certainly what he did with my clan,” he says, crossing his arms before him in what living in the village has taught Tobirama is the classic Uchiha pouting pose. “Always holding back in the battlefield, always calling out with offers of peace – better terms every time, like a bribe – caring for prisoners of war and sending them back without even imposing terms –”

Tobirama shrugs. “It’s what worked,” he explains. “Your clan needed repeated reassurance of our good intentions before they’d yield to peace talks, much less see the village as something that would be beneficial to their interests. You’re too numerous, too powerful, and too proud to just be broken to the yoke the way we did the Hatake, for example.”

Madara’s chakra simmers close beneath his skin, pulsing with the accelerated beat of his heart. “The Hatake? The wild ones, with the wolves and dogs? I knew they’d agreed in principle to sign on to the village before we did…what happened to them?”

Tobirama shrugs again. He doesn’t like to think of it, though he’d recognized the necessity of having a clan on their side capable of matching and opposing the Inuzuka; but all logic aside, something in him always twists at the memory of those proud lightning-white men and women falling to their knees in supplication, tears in their eyes and oaths of unbreakable loyalty on their tongues if only Hashirama’s forest of deadly briars would release the less-human members of their pack –

The Hatake valued each other more than they did victory, and Hashirama knows very well how to make love into a leash and a lash to force others to bow to his will.

As so the Hatake bowed.

Some of them, anyway; the truly wild ones found that they could not bend without breaking.

There were – less of those, now, than there once had been.

The Inuzuka should give daily prayers of thanks that they had allied with the Uchiha, not Senju.

“Hashirama convinced them that peace was for the best,” he says shortly. They didn’t discuss clan politics, Madara and him; as a typical matter, they barely discussed anything other than the administration of the village. “It’s _Hashirama_ ; you know what he’s like when he gets his mind set on something.”

And that’s the crux of the matter, isn’t it?

Madara is Hashirama’s _best friend_. Madara is the one who understood Hashirama’s dream of peace before anyone else did, maybe even before Hashirama himself did – the one who helped give that dream form and shape, when before it was nothing more than the confused yearning for never-ending conquest that the oldest clan records warned would eventually consume most wielders of the Mokuton.

Losing Madara turned those dreams into concrete ambitions.

Madara being forced to choose between his family and his friend had taught Hashirama the importance of having the power to take and defend what he wanted; being denied by him had taught Hashirama patience; fighting him had taught Hashirama the benefits of cleverness and manipulation when raw power wasn’t enough to get him what he wanted.

Everything that Hashirama is, however twisted, Madara helped create.

Surely, then, that means that Madara, like Tobirama, knows exactly what Hashirama is like.

But if he knows what Hashirama is like –

Well.

That means that his current state of irritation and confusion must be due to Tobirama, instead.

It’s – a disappointment, Tobirama isn’t going to lie, but it’s one he’s long grown accustomed to. For all his ruthlessness, Hashirama rarely faces the consequences of his decisions. He is endlessly charismatic, kind and generous and friendly to a fault, and even people who are angry at his decisions can’t bring themselves to be angry at him. They love him too much, they value him too much; their minds cannot reconcile their love and their anger, and so they displace it.

It’s so much easier to blame Tobirama for not having stopped Hashirama from acting, than to blame Hashirama for having decided to act in the first place.

Even Madara, when it came to matters of village infrastructure –

(Sometimes Tobirama wants to scream in Madara’s face a reminder that he is his brother’s right hand, for better or for worse; his brother innovates and he implements, and not every decision made was made by him – not even the ones that seem cruel and even pointless, ones that can only be understood as the deliberate breaking of clan bonds in favor of loyalty to the village as a whole. Some of those were his, yes, but many, even most, were not. No one knows better the delicate fragility of an ecosystem, how easy it is to disrupt and reshape it, than the master of the Mokuton.)

But it’s fine.

Tobirama’s used to it.

A red-eyed child born to whispers among a clan that hated such things, younger brother to the living fulfillment of the promise of their bloodline –

He’s used to shouldering the weight of Hashirama’s wrongs.

Still, he must admit that he’d hoped, a little, that this would be something at which he could excel, the way he did at fighting or jutsu creation, rather than yet another field where he would never be more than a (not-Hashirama-never-Hashirama) disappointment.

(Only Hashirama loves him enough to never find him lacking. Knowing that, how could Tobirama not do everything in his power to please him?)

“I usually improve on repetition,” he finally says, hoping to distract Madara from whatever it was he was stewing angrily over, his chakra a feeling of _summer thunderstorms, clouds filled to bursting with warm wet water and lightning to burn a man alive_.

“How’s that?” Madara asks, looking up with a frown.

“I improve on repetition,” Tobirama repeats. “Let me suck you again – I thought I was getting pretty decent at that; I’m certain I can do better the second time.”

Maybe the fucking hadn’t gone as Madara might’ve hoped (a disappointment, if so, as Tobirama had rather enjoyed that), but his chakra teemed with lust when Tobirama had been on his knees.

Oddly enough, the suggestion causes Madara to flush bright red, Tobirama observes without entirely understanding, and to start flailing his limbs wildly around like he’s an untrained genin rather than the highly controlled shinobi Tobirama admires on the battlefield.

His chakra is black with lust again, though, summer thunder giving way to the slithering inexorable hiss of lava, a river of flame and earth but a river nonetheless and therefore falling within his domain, so Tobirama thinks there’s a decent chance of convincing Madara.

“– what in the world gave you the idea that you need to _do better_?!” he shouts.

Tobirama arches his eyebrows. For all his fearsome reputation as a sensor on the battlefield, people sometimes forget about it in the face of his overwhelming awkwardness in social settings. But his problem has never been figuring out what people are feeling – his senses tell him that, overwhelming and sometimes excruciating – but in figuring out how those feelings transmute into thoughts, and thoughts into words, and in determining how his own words could affect those thoughts and those feelings in turn –

For all his talent at repurposing jutsus and seals, Tobirama has never mastered that strange alchemy of dealing with _other people_ that it seems that all the rest of the world knows to do by instinct.

“You’re obviously upset,” he points out, his voice level and calm. It may be that Madara, a sensor himself, thinks that Tobirama must be actively using his chakra in order to read him; it’s a mistake that Tobirama finds sensors make even more often than others. He’s not like the other sensors in that way – he was born with his eyes closed and his mind open, and he can count on his fingers the number of times in his life that he hasn’t felt the chakra of others. When his chakra is exhausted, it is the last of his skills to go; when it is sealed, if the seal is not Uzumaki-made, it is the first to return, seeping in through the inevitable cracks in the seal. “I’m not blind.”

“And you’re, what, offering me sex to cheer me up? _Better_ sex, apparently, because you somehow got it into your head that your first effort was somehow _inadequate_?”

“Wasn’t it? My performance being somehow lacking seems like the most obvious explanation for your – ” _boiling water furiously gushing out from a deep crack in the earth burning all it touches_ “– mood, since nothing else of note has happened.”

“Nothing else has..! Hashirama _locked us in here_ and _ordered_ us to have sex!”

Tobirama blinks. How is that different from what he said?

Madara throws his hands into the air. “Do you honestly not see a problem with Hashirama just – _deciding_ your life for you?”

“Not…really?” Tobirama says, things becoming clearer with the question. He thinks he might understand the problem Madara’s having. “He’s my older brother, and the head of my family, and the head of my clan, and my Hokage. My life belongs to him to spend as he wishes; it always has. And now that you’re part of the village, so does yours, though it’s undoubtedly an easier adjustment for me than for you.”

Unlike him, Madara has spent the last few years being the leader of his own clan, his own general. Could that be the issue? That he has simply forgotten how it was to live and serve at the will of another?

“It’s easier if you stop making a fuss about the little things and save your protests for when they might actually do some good,” he adds, hoping that he can help make the transition easier for Madara. “He may be unbearably arrogant about it sometimes, but Hashirama does usually seem to know best.”

The universe itself bows to Hashirama’s will, and Tobirama does not flatter himself to think he is somehow an exception.

“There is,” Madara says through gritted teeth, “a _difference_ between having the ability to spend the life of a shinobi under your care, to send them on missions they might not return from or to lead them into battle, and in – in _managing their sex lives_. You can’t possibly tell me that Hashirama does this with everyone in your clan!”

Tobirama thinks of Hashirama’s tendency to match-make, usually facilitated by abusing Tobirama’s sensor abilities to determine who has feelings for who and deciding whether the pairing was beneficial enough to let it flower or, if not, to yank it out by the roots like a weed, but he knows that’s not what Madara means.

“I’m pretty sure he limits his, uh, personal involvement to people he – cares about,” he offers. “You should take it as a compliment.”

Madara hisses like a teapot, even as his chakra curls around him like gushing steam.

“You’ve lusted after him for years,” Tobirama points out, increasingly confused. “You must have known he’d take advantage of it one day.”

Hashirama is far too manipulative not to take advantage of such a weakness. Tobirama had personally expected it to be used to support some major initiative in regards to the village, either a war or (far worse in Hashirama’s mind) the threat of Madara leaving again, so if anything he finds himself rather complimented that Hashirama thinks enough of him to use him like this.

“He _knew_ –”

“I’m a sensor. _I_ knew, which meant that he knew. Lots of people feel lust around him, or me; he doesn’t use it against everyone. It’s an honor.”

Madara covers his face with his hands, muttering something about captivity bonding not generally applying to sibling relationships, and also about brainwashing being particularly effective on stupid selfless Senju, but after a moment he says, voice slightly muffled through his fingers, “I think Hashirama might not be – entirely sane. You must realize that this isn’t normal. This isn’t how clan heads behave. Or brothers, for that matter.”

Tobirama shrugs. It’s not that he doesn’t know that the latter is true, though he’s suspicious of Madara’s claim as to the former. There are brothers who fight over their inheritance, brothers who raise sword against sword, brothers who live in the same house but hate each other – far better to have Hashirama’s love than his indifference or his hate, no matter what form that love takes. It’s all Tobirama has, and beggars cannot be choosers.

“It’s what Hashirama wants,” he finally says, since it seems like Madara’s waiting for him to say something.

Madara scowls. “Is there any part of you that doesn’t think first and foremost of what Hashirama wants?” he snaps.

Tobirama considers the question seriously – it might be rhetorical, but he’s never been good at figuring out when people want answers or not, so it’s easier to just reply as if they are. “New justus,” he finally offers. “And seals. The process of creating new ones bores Hashirama, but even he has to admit it’s useful, so he doesn’t stop me. Training, too – it irritates him, sometimes, how much time I spend on it, but he knows it’s necessary to make sure I don’t die in the battlefield, so he allows it.”

Madara groans. His chakra is a bizarre mix of irritation-affection-protectiveness that makes Tobirama want to shiver – having it aimed his way is like standing in the rapids of a river letting the water thunder over him, welcoming but fiercely dangerous all the same – and he shakes his head. “Of course. I should’ve guessed; no wonder you spend so much time on those. I’m going to kill Hashirama for pushing you into this.”

Tobirama isn’t worried: there’s not even the smallest drop of killing intent in Madara’s chakra right now.

“I’ll do better to try to stop him next time,” he promises, even though he already regrets the loss. “Or at least to try to refuse him; that might slow him down.”

Madara lifts his head at last, looking at Tobirama, his eyes suddenly intent. “It’s not your responsibility to stop him, you know. Why would you – oh, _damn_. Everyone always blames you for not stopping him, don’t they? Even me, I’ve been…damn. _Damn_. Of course you can’t control him; you’re younger, and weaker, and he doesn’t have to listen to you – no. That ends. That ends _now_. It’s about time Hashirama took the blame for his own choices.”

Tobirama feels – warm. All over. Madara’s chakra pours over him the way his best jutsu do, power and feeling muffling his senses until there’s nothing around him but _Madara-Madara-Madara_.

Is this what it feels like, to be the object of Madara’s affections?

No wonder Hashirama is so reluctant to risk losing him again.

“You liked it, though, didn’t you?” Madara asks, and he’s suddenly right in front of Tobirama, crouched before him, warm hands on Tobirama’s shoulders, intense gaze focused on Tobirama’s face even as Tobirama averts his eyes on instinct. “Even if Hashirama directed it, you still liked it, with me – you should have things you like.”

Tobirama swallows, his lips suddenly dry. “If you don’t want – if you regret –”

“I object to Hashirama’s lack of concern for consent,” Madara says. “But you – that was your first time. You shouldn’t regret it; I certainly don’t.”

He smiles, then, and his chakra flares again, this time dark and hungry.

“You’re not the only one who _improves on repetition_ , you know. What did you like, the first time? I can do it again. I can do it _better_.”

Tobirama’s skin feels red and hot. How could it not, surrounded by Madara’s warmth?

“I – I –” He’s stuttering. He _never_ stutters. “Kiss me?”

Madara does.

His lips and his tongue and his hands trace over Tobirama’s face and Tobirama’s making sounds like an animal again, needy and desperate already and they’ve barely done anything but somehow Madara’s pulled him into his lap and is tracing lines across his body and it’s wonderful.

“What else?” Madara breathes against his lips. “What else did you like? What was good for you?”

Tobirama’s dazed and hot and not quite thinking, which is probably why he blurts out, “When you like something.”

Madara’s eyebrows go up even as Tobirama flushes. “I asked what was good for you, not for me.”

“I was answering your question,” Tobirama says, because the only way to continue once you’ve started is to keep going. “I…when you like something, your chakra flares. It’s –”

He can feel his face going lax, his eyes dreamy and unfocused in the power of the memory of it, Madara’s _hot-boiling-metal_ chakra all around him and even inside of him, and he doesn’t know what he looks like but from the way Madara’s cock twitches under him he thinks he must look quite obscene.

“It was good,” he finally concludes, however inadequate that is to explain it.

“My chakra,” Madara murmurs. “You were sensing? _Then_?”

Tobirama shrugs. “Always.”

“Hn. And feeling me makes you make a face like _that_ , all greedy for me…how sensitive _are_ you? Is it like this with everyone?”

“N-no,” Tobirama’s voice cracks over the word when Madara deliberately washes his chakra over him, hot as always but this time with intent, an animal on the hunt. No wonder they make the perfect match, Madara and Hashirama; Hashirama contains with him the world of plants, but Madara’s core is all animal instinct. “Not everyone. Just – you’re very strong. Like Hashirama. He can blind me with his, if he wants.”

“I bet I could do the same,” Madara says, smirking. “But I’d rather see if I can make you beg with it.”

And suddenly he’s on top of Tobirama, tumbling him back onto the bed and pressing him down with body and hands and chakra all together, and everything is _too much_ but in a good way where he can’t see or hear or feel anything but Madara, Madara and that chakra of his – the taste of metal on his tongue the feeling of boiling water around his body the sound of hissing steam and nothing to see with his eyes but spinning Sharingan red –

Everything gets a little blurry after that.

Madara’s lips on his throat, on his chest, on his cock. His hands on his hips, on his thighs, around his throat to hold him down (and oh, _that’s_ why Madara had liked it so much –). His fingers tracing patterns over his skin that make Tobirama think wildly of seals he could make just for this, just to keep this feeling forever, and he’s never been jealous of the Sharingan before, never wanted the ability to brand memories into his brain for all eternity his near-perfect memory doing that well enough already but now he burns with envy because Madara will have this forever while he’ll one day forget and the only solution to that is to keep Madara with him so they can do it again –

“You’re crying,” Madara whispers, and traces his cheek with his tongue, kissing him so Tobirama can taste the salt. “Is this too much for you?”

Yes.

But Tobirama doesn’t care, clinging to Madara and begging as well as he can for more, not sure if those are words or merely mindless sounds pouring from his throat and finally Madara gives him what he wants, what he needs, and it’s too much _too much_ but Tobirama doesn’t care because it’s _his_.

He comes, a wash of relief that has him seeing stars, but Madara doesn’t stop there, just keeps working him over, touching him, fucking him, and he gets hard again too soon _too much_ and then there’s that chakra again, drowing him, and he’s coming a second time, sobbing with the pain-pleasure-perfect of it.

He clutches to Madara, eyes wide and vacant, memorizing all of him, and Hashirama is _right_ , of course he is, he always is, always knows best, because Tobirama _needs_ Madara, he has to have him not just now but always, he has to keep him and that means he can’t go.

Madara has to stay with them, with Tobirama and Hashirama, and maybe he’s still a little angry with Hashirama right now but he’ll get over it and they’ll have their village and they’ll have each other and who even cares how it happened, just that it _did_.

“I’ll show you how to like it,” Tobirama whispers in Madara’s ear, wrapping his longer legs around him; he feels drunk with the joy of it, the words spilling from his mouth without his conscious control, saying what he needs to stay. “I know Hashirama’s a lot, but he loves you, he loves you like he loves me, totally and completely, nothing will ever change that, _nothing_ , not ever, and it’s wonderful. It’s so good and it’s so much _better_ when he’s happy, you have no idea. You’ll see, though. I’ll show you. He’ll show you. You’ll stay with us and we’ll make you happy, you’ll be happy with us, you’ll be so happy that you’ll forget you ever wanted anything else; I’ll teach you how to give yourself up and you’ll teach me this, and we’ll be happy, _he’ll_ be happy, and nothing else matters –”

Madara moans, moving harder and faster, his body wild, his chakra furious like a hurricane, like a typhoon, like a tsunami, rushing relentless and unstoppable, but Tobirama is the master of water, no matter what temperature, and he can ride out these overwhelming sensations the same way.

“You’ll stay forever,” Tobirama says, because he knows that’s what Hashirama wants, because that’s what he wants, too. “You’ll be mine and I’ll be yours and we’ll both be _his_ –”

“Yes,” Madara whispers against him. “Yes – _yes_ –”

And suddenly there’s not just Madara there, black-animal-lust-hot-boiling-metal, but something else, too, something familiar, something white-bright-life-pleased-happy-warm, chakra that’s as familiar to Tobirama as his own. Hashirama’s hands come down on both of them, something green and intricate and full of power twining out from his fingers to wrap around their, almost choking with the desire to hold them tight and safe and his, and he says, “You’re both so good for me.”

And that’s it, Tobirama’s coming again, a _third_ time, painful and dry but endlessly wonderful, and Madara is howling as he comes, too, and – yes, this is good.

This is perfect.

Hashirama really does know best.


	4. Punishment 1

Tobirama stumbles a little when he leaves his labs, but that’s probably just because he ran out of food at some point and didn’t bother to stop what he was doing to get more.   
  
It’s fine, though. Totally worthwhile. He’s come up with something really great, tested it and recorded it, and once his chakra reserves are back the way they ought to be, he’ll show it to Hashirama and -  
  
Hashirama’s here.  
  
Why is Hashirama here at home in the middle of the day?   
  
Tobirama squints at his brother, who has his arms crossed over his chest and a scowl. “Don’t you have work you’re supposed to be doing?”  
  
“I declared a holiday.”  
  
That gets Tobirama’s attention. “Anija, no!” he exclaims. “Do you know what an administrative nightmare a new holiday would -”  
  
“He’s joking,” Madara interjects, because he appears to have also skived off work for the day. Is Tobirama the only person with a work ethic around here? “We finished today’s meetings early and took the rest of our work home. We’ve been worried about you.”  
  
Tobirama blinks owlishly at them. “Worried…?”  
  
“You’ve been in there for six days,” Madara continues, scowling. “And from the look of you…have you slept at all?”  
  
That depends; do catnaps count as sleep?  
  
…maybe he shouldn’t answer that question.   
  
Not that it matters; he’s sure the bags under his eyes tell the truth for him.  
  
“You’ve been very naughty, making us worry like that,” Hashirama says, clicking his tongue in disapproval. “That’s not very nice of you, you know. I think you need to be punished.”  
  
Tobirama is going to protest, because whatever Hashirama might think he is _not_ a child anymore, except suddenly Hashirama is shining very bright, chakra overwhelming, and it’s going straight to his head and -  
  
Tobirama wakes up feeling considerably more refreshed.  
  
Also, in a more concerning development, unable to move.  
  
At all.  
  
There are roots and vines twined everywhere around him, immobilizing each limb, crossing over his chest and hips, even climbing up to hold his head and neck steady. His chakra is being suppressed – with an Uzumaki seal, no less, so breaking it will cost more than it’s probably worth.  
  
He’s stuck.  
  
But not unsafe.  
  
“Oh, good,” his anija sings out from somewhere he can’t see. Not that it matters; his comforting chakra is everywhere around, meaning that Tobirama hasn’t tensed up or started to panic. “You’re awake!”  
  
The roots ripple around him - a surprisingly pleasant feeling - and next thing Tobirama knows he’s suspended upright, hanging from the wall and still unable to move.  
  
“Why?” he asks, meaning his current situation, since asking to be let go would clearly be futile.   
  
Hashirama cups his face in both hands, pressing a kiss to Tobirama’s forehead. “You worked yourself into near chakra exhaustion. Again. What if you’d collapsed in your labs?”  
  
Then he would lie there until time had healed him, like he’d done before. Obviously.  
  
Equally obviously, telling Hashirama that was not going to be conductive to getting out of this.  
  
“You shouldn’t worry your big brother like that,” Hashirama continues sternly. “If you can’t be trusted to take care of yourself, I’m just going to have to do it for you.”  
  
Tobirama sighs. He knows where this is going.  
  
 "You’re just going to be punishing yourself, too, you know, keeping me tied up like this,“ he tries. “If you don’t let me down, you’ll have to do my paperwork.”  
  
Hashirama’s grin tells him his gambit isn’t going to work this time.  
  
Whatever. It’s fine! While admittedly this level of total immobilization is moderately new, Hashirama has locked him away before, tied him up like this before, it’s something he does when he wants to reestablish control; Tobirama can handle it. Sure, he’s helpless, but it’s just _Hashirama_. Hashirama would never truly hurt him…unless he thought it was for Tobirama’s own good, anyway.  
  
Still. He’s mostly safe.  
  
“What. What are you _doing_?”  
  
…right. Madara lives here now, too.   
  
Tobirama feels the back of his neck go hot with embarrassment.   
  
Madara’s presence is…new. He’d tried to go home after their little week together - and seriously who was Hashirama kidding with his concerns about chakra exhaustion, he’d nearly killed them all with _sexual_ exhaustion - only for Hashirama to announce that it was rather inconvenient for members of the Hokage’s office to live far away from the administrative center and that Madara, as the only one distant, should move in with them.

Madara asked, very politely, if he was insane.

Hashirama responded by suggesting, very kindly, that if Madara preferred to limp on home, stinking of sex and newly applied ink, to explain himself (and the brand-new tattoo on the sole of his foot) to his brother and the rest of his clan, he was welcome to do so.

Madara agreed to move in with somewhat alarming alacrity.

Tobirama hadn’t quite understood what was wrong with explaining (he himself would never, of course, but then he’s a very private person, while Madara had always struck him as rather extroverted in comparison, particularly with his close family), but he’d been cheered, briefly, by the thought that maybe, just maybe, he could _finally_ escape being used as Hashirama’s favorite cuddling pillow every night.

No such luck.

It turns out that Madara is _also_ a rather aggressive cuddler, and somehow Tobirama seems to always end up lying right in the middle. It’s a good thing he enjoys being warm at night or else he would be forced to murder them both as they tug him back and forth between them in their sleep.

Really, is it any wonder he retreated to his labs at first instance?

Though maybe – and he’d never admit this out loud – he _may_ have gotten a little bit carried away, if it was enough to make Hashirama break out…this.

“I’m punishing him!” Hashirama chirps, entirely unphased by Madara’s twitching. “So that he learns it’s not good to worry us like that.”

Notably, Hashirama doesn’t suggest that he thinks this will be effective at deterring Tobirama from doing it again in the future should Tobirama think the cause justified. He’s at least figured out that much.

Madara’s mouth opens and closes mutely for a moment. “So you tie him up on your wall? Naked?” he finally says.

“He clearly can’t be trusted to take care of himself,” Hashirama sniffs. “So I’m going to have to do it for him.”

Tobirama really isn’t looking forward to being spoon-fed again. It’s _humiliating_ , even if Hashirama takes such glee in doing so.

It’s not that Tobirama minds being hand-fed in the normal course of events – he’s certain that Hashirama’s been sticking food in his mouth with a “Try this, Tobirama!” since he was a baby, so at this point he’s resigned himself – but he has a distinctive distaste for being fed because he can’t use his arms.

Worst punishment ever.

“…he seems uncomfortable,” Madara finally says, after apparently dismissing at least five other objections that seemed to come to mind.

“It’s a _punishment_ ,” Hashirama points out. “He hates keeping still –”

“He sits still all the time.”

“No, he fidgets. Haven’t you seen him playing with that spinning figurine the Nara gave us, the one on his desk?”

“I thought he did that just to irritate me.”

No, that was just a fringe benefit.

“I’m fairly sure that’s just extra fun,” Hashirama, who knows him too well, says with a shrug. “He used to fidget with his arms but he – doesn’t anymore. Anyway, he hates being kept still, which makes it a perfect punishment. I usually keep him like this for a few days.”

There’s an entire history in that brief pause, of Tobirama’s one point of contention with their father and tears shed on Hashirama’s shoulder and the way their father sometimes coughed up flower petals in the weeks before he died while Hashirama smiled, but that wasn’t history Madara needed to know.

Not when Madara’s already done so much for Tobirama already, the hot press of his lips on Tobirama’s chest and the wash of forgiveness turning a mark of shame into nothing but old scar tissue. There was no need to burden him with more.

“A few days seems a bit much,” Madara says, crossing his arms. “Especially since the village will probably fall apart without him.”

“See, anija?” Tobirama can’t help but say. “I told you.”

“We manage fine when he goes out on mission,” Hashirama says, ignoring him entirely.

(That was the other part of this punishment that Tobirama disliked: Hashirama would dote on him or ignore him, but Tobirama never has any say in the matter when he was bound like this.)

Madara’s still frowning, though, so Hashirama finally heaves a great big sigh and says, “Well, if you like, I could do something faster if you promise to help.”

Madara squints at him suspiciously. “Promises to you are dangerous, as I’ve recently learned,” he says.

Tobirama can’t help but snort at that. “Recently? You’re the one who promised to build a village with him; now look where we are.”

Madara doesn’t look at him, keeping his eyes focused on Hashirama, but he hasn’t mastered Hashirama’s ability to compartmentalize anything he doesn’t immediately care to think about so Tobirama still sees it when his lips twitch upwards suspiciously.

Hashirama shrugs grandly. “It’s not like I’m going to force you –”

“Since when?” Madara and Tobirama ask in unison.

_Definitely_ a twitch of Madraa’s lips then.

Hashirama pouts at them both.

It’s an absurd expression on someone so powerful.

“Tobirama, what do you think?” Madara asks, surprising Tobirama. “It’s your – er – punishment.”

“I feel like asking that defeats the purpose of this exercise,” Hashirama grumbles.

“I’m sure you’ll find a way to make me suffer either way, anija,” Tobirama says, automatically reaching for a way to comfort and support his brother. It’s a terrible instinct, especially under circumstances like this.

Hashirama brightens, though, and that’s worth anything.

…he thinks.

“Fast and with audience participation it is,” Hashirama declares, because of course he thinks that any decision left to Tobirama is his to decide, and unfortunately he’s not wrong about that.

Tobirama still takes the time to nod at Madara, who in a rather confusing turn of events seems to care much more about whether Tobirama agrees to things and who prefers confirmation that Tobirama doesn’t mind. Which he doesn’t! He’s already resigned himself to whatever Hashirama has in mind – especially since Hashirama will be absolutely insufferable if he doesn’t get a chance to try whatever he’s thought up – but also he really would rather be able to move sooner rather than later.

So it’s basically the same as him agreeing.

Then Hashirama whispers in Madara’s ear, which is mildly worrying, and Madara smirks, which is more worrying, and next thing Tobirama knows he’s got Madara’s mouth on his cock, which is _very_ worrying but also mind-blowing enough that it distracts him from worrying.

“You realize, anija,” he chokes out, trying desperately to thrust into Madara’s hot mouth even though he knows logically that it’s a terrible idea and he’s only setting himself up for future misery, and anyway that it’s pointless because his hips are being forced into stillness right now, “that sexual deprivation isn’t going to work every time.”

“I don’t know,” Hashirama says, sprawling out in a chair that curls its way out of the floor. He’s never bothered to go get an existing chair in his life, even if there is one two feet away as there is now, and this is why Tobirama’s always giving people sets of slightly mismatched chairs as housewarming presents. Eventually someone’s going to figure out his motives. “I think I have a good window of time before it stops being effective. That’s good enough for now, Madara, come back here.”

Tobirama whines when Madara retreats, which he knows is essentially conceding Hashirama’s point, but _still_.

Madara’s chakra crackles, making him whine again as the nerves down his spine light up, and it’s really entirely unfair how quickly Madara learned to do that.

It’s also unfair how much Hashirama has warmed to the idea of providing visual stimulation (if by stimulation Tobirama means additional torture, which he does), because he’s pulled Madara into his lap and watching Madara sprawl out like that, all boneless and moaning and head lolled back onto Hashirama’s shoulder as Hashirama’s clever fingers work him over –

Unfair.

Tobirama struggles to move, even knowing that he can’t, and he feels that burn of humiliation that he always gets when he fails to escape except now it’s mixing in with lust in a way that speaks worryingly of Hashirama’s future plans and how he’s playing right into them but he really can’t bring himself to care right now because he just wants – _something_.

“You’re doing so well for me, Madara,” Hashirama purrs into Madara’s ear. “Helping me like this, worrying about Tobirama – you’re the best friend a man could have.”

“I – I feel like we’ve gone – ah – somewhat beyond – _yes_ , that, more of that– beyond friendship at this point,” Madara pants.

“Nonsense. Whatever else we are, we’re still friends,” Hashirama says. “You’re my dearest friend, my precious person, and I’ll love you forever and always, no matter what.”

And he means it, too, shining and sincere, charismatic enough to make anyone believe in him even if he were lying but it’s all the more potent because he’s _not_.

Tobirama feels what is almost a prickle of jealousy, but he learned that he must share his brother’s love with Madara years ago by a riverbank and had that lessons seared into his mind again during that previous week, so instead of jealousy he just feels envy that Hashirama is praising Madara and not him.

If that’s the punishment, it’s a very good one, but somehow Tobirama suspects there’s more to it.

“In fact, you’ve been so good, I should reward you,” Hashirama continues. “Would you like a reward, Madara? Say please.”

Madara grunts.

Hashirama leans down and _bites_ Madara’s shoulder, sharp and sudden, and Madara’s whole body spasms in a way that suggests he enjoyed it tremendously.

“Use your words, Madara,” Hashirama scolds, if anything said in that low growl, menacing and overwhelmingly sexual, could be properly classified as scolding. “Come on, pet, you can do it for me.”

It takes another minute of torment, but eventually Madara forces out a desperate-sounding “ _please_ ” between his lips, biting them with his teeth until they’re red and plump and Tobirama wants to kiss him more than anything.

Well, maybe not more than he wants to come, watching them like that, or more than he wants to join them, but – more than anything else.

Hashirama’s not done, though.

“Please what?” he asks, eyes round with innocence.

“Please – _reward_ me,” Madara chokes out between groans. “Please!”

“Well, all right. Since you asked so nicely. How about a nice show?”

Show? What type of –

Tobirama feels one of the vines curled around his legs unwind just a little, making its slow, creeping way up his inner thigh.

Oh.

_That_ type of show.

No, wait – Hashirama can’t mean – not with his _Mokuton_ , not with vines and roots instead of hands and fingers and –

“ _Anija_!” he shouts, feeling the vine slide up higher and start to prod in a purposeful sort of way. Hashirama’s used the Mokuton on him before, of course, and even during _that week_ he used it liberally enough to hold him down or move him in place but he’s never – not _inside_ –

“Shh,” Hashirama says. “You’re being punished; this is Madara’s reward. You should be quiet and let him enjoy it.”

Tobirama opens his mouth to say – something, he’s not sure what, but he’s certain he would have come up with something adequately snarky and cutting, except before he can get a word out there’s a thick wooden branch sliding between his lips, fat and heavy on his tongue, and he can’t do more than make incoherent noises around it as it forces his jaw open wide.

“Oh,” Madara says, a half-choked off sound full of something like wonder, and Tobirama feels his face burning again. It hadn’t occurred to him how it would look, his lips wrapped around the branch as if he were sucking it, but now that it has he can’t stop thinking about it. 

It’s only made worse when Hashirama’s murmur – “Look what a pretty picture he makes” – drifts over to him.

The roots binding his body start shifting then, too.  They don’t give him any leeway to move, but crawl all over his body, alternatively tight and confining or soft and stroking, and Tobirama finds himself whimpering as they curl up on his chest, flicking at his nipples until he’s sure they’re bright red against his pale skin, as red as his cock is, hard and straining and wrapped around with one of Hashirama’s vines that start moving back and forth in a pale imitation of what Hashirama’s hand is doing to Madara.

It’s such a conflicting burst of sensations – the tightness around his cock, the branch in his mouth, the feelers on his chest, the feeling of two chakras pouring over him, the sight of Madara falling to pieces before him – that Tobirama, unforgivably, forgets for a moment about the vine between his legs.

Naturally, that’s the moment that it pushes into him, slick and wet with its own sap, and the surprise makes him shout, muffled by the branch in his mouth as it is.

“What are you doing to him?” he hears Madara ask, but he’s distracted by the strange way it feels – the vine is cool, not warmed with blood the way fingers or a cock would be, and it twists around inside of him in an altogether unfamiliar way.

“Let me show you,” Hashirama says, and suddenly Tobirama is moving – not of his own volition, but _being_ moved, the roots rearranging his body as if he were a doll to be posed at Hashirama’s pleasure – for _Madara’s_ pleasure.

The posing comparison is particularly apt, he finds, as the roots put him on display. He feels himself burn up again, that overwhelming humiliation-tempered-by-lust sweeping through him again, as his legs are spread open and raised up so that Madara can see him, pinned and immobile, getting fucked not by a person, no, but by the manifestation of Hashirama’s will, watch him reduced to writhing and grunting and moaning by nothing more than a vine –

A second vine slides up his legs, a smaller one, twining around the one already there, and Tobirama has less than a moment to realize what it’s going to do before it does it and suddenly there are two vines moving in and out of him, one dedicated to hitting that spot within him that makes him see stars and the other to opening him further, pushing in deeper and harder, and he moans.

“Fuck,” he hears Madara say. “Oh, _fuck_ , look at him – just _look_ –”

“I bet I can fit another in his mouth, too,” Hashirama says conversationally, and Tobirama doesn’t think he’s right because his jaw is already aching but apparently he’s wrong, he _can_ fit in two, and now he’s got them thrusting in there as well – less a gag now than a substitute for a cock, and he can feel himself drooling all over them, leaking from the corners of his mouth, messy and filthy; he must look disgusting –

“Beautiful,” Madara says. “So beautiful.”

And now Tobirama’s burning again, embarrassed beyond belief that Madara is seeing him like this, skewered open like this.

Even his _hands_ are being used now, thick vines slipping in through his fingers and with the barest encouragement from Hashirama he finds himself working his hands up and down them as if they were real.

“Beautiful,” Madara says again, and that’s enough, that’s reason enough even if he knows he’ll wake up in the middle of the night for weeks thinking of this moment, blushing furiously at the sight he must be making, the _display_ he’s putting on, whorish, so greedy that not even the half-dozen thick vines Hashirama is forcing on him is enough.

And he hears Hashirama saying as much, too, laughing at him, teasing him, “Look at him,” he says, “all that and he still wants more, don’t you think? Look at my stern, serious little brother, always proper, knowing every rule of etiquette; look at him now, what do you think of him now?”

“I think he’s perfect,” Madara says, his voice low.

“Oh, he is,” and Hashirama’s voice is fond as ever, fond and loving, and that’s why Tobirama lets him do things like this, obscene things he’s never even imagined, all because he loves him so. “He’s always perfect, my Tobirama – perfect fighter, perfect scholar, perfect administrator, perfect little _slut_.”

Humiliation should make him thrash with fury, embarrassment should make him turn away in shame, but instead his cock is leaking and tears stream down his face as he tries so hard to thrust his hips only to be stopped by the vines. As an object lesson, it’s a very good one: he’s not in control here, not at all, not even over instinctual responses that his body is begging him for.

Everything about him belongs to Hashirama, now just as always, and by hurting himself he’s hurt something of his brother’s and that is not allowed.

“What do you think, Madara? Look at him – perfect, just like you said. Putting on a display like that, the perfect wanton little whore. The best brothel in Konoha couldn’t put up someone better than him, taking all of that at once like that and enjoying it too. Doesn’t seem like much of a punishment, though, does it, with him enjoying it so much – I bet he’d do it for real if we asked nicely enough, don’t you?”

Tobirama writhes, red in his cheeks and his ears and blush going down his chest because he wouldn’t, he _wouldn’t_ , surely, he has too much pride than that, too much dignity –

But if his brother _asked…_

“Think about it,” Hashirama laughs in Madara’s ear, Madara’s eyes spinning red as he brands the image Tobirama is making into his brain forever. “The village’d never lack for money if we rented him out. People would line up for the privilege, and no one would care how many he’s had before as long as he takes them, too. Or maybe we could offer him to visiting diplomats as a perk – see how well they negotiate in the morning when they’ve had him on his knees the night before, sucking them all off, letting them come on his face, on his hands, on his body until he’s sopping wet –”

“ _No_ ,” Madara growls, and his gaze is so intense that Tobirama imagines he can feel it on his skin, burning and hot and dark the way his chakra is, bubbling oil scorching him from the inside. “No one else. He’s _ours_.”

Tobirama wants to say something, do something – wants to kiss Madara, take him into his arms, thank him somehow – but he can’t do anything, anything at all; he’s entirely at their mercy.

Hashirama laughs again.

“All ours, yes,” he says, smug and satisfied. “All _mine_ , both of you. I could have you like this any time I want, Tobirama, you know that, right? Doesn’t matter where or when: all the houses are made of wood.  Just think about that for a moment. You could be in my office, sitting at your desk; you could be kneeling at the dinner table at home; you could be snug asleep in your bed, and none of it would matter. You’d never have the slightest warning until my roots are wrapped around you.”

Tobirama’s thinking about it, oh, he’s thinking about it. Thinks about waking up in the middle of the night already split open, legs pushed apart before he was ever aware; thinks about his office chair suddenly reaching up for him when his mind is preoccupied with paperwork; thinks about the flimsy door to the Hokage office and the window where shinobi come through on a regular basis without warning – where they could _see_ –

Yes, he’s thinking.

He really wishes sometimes that he could _stop_ thinking.

He wishes he could beg Hashirama for forgiveness, for mercy, for _relief_ , but gagged as he is he can’t do more than plead with his eyes.

“Should we have pity?” Hashirama asks Madara. “I don’t know. I’m not sure he’s adequately made it up to us, all that worrying he’s put us through. I think we need a little more.”

Tobirama’s not sure what more he can possibly give.

But Hashirama’s voice is dropping too low to be overheard and he’s whispering instructions in Madara’s ear, Madara nodding obediently – because everyone obeys Hashirama eventually – and the next thing Tobirama knows Madara’s not in Hashirama’s lap anymore, he’s pressed up hot and heavy against Tobirama, and the vines between Tobirama’s legs are pulling out, leaving him empty, but Madara’s there for him, pushing in instead.

It’s so much better, hot flesh giving easily the way the wood and plant matter didn’t, and Tobirama moans, helplessly approving.

The branches slip out of his mouth, too, and Madara kisses him, whispering, “Beautiful” at him even though Tobirama knows his face is wet with tears and drool. He’s not beautiful, he knows he’s not, and especially not now, but sometimes when Madara says it he could almost believe it.

But then Hashirama’s there, too, pressed up behind him, pressing up _inside_ him, first fingers and then cock, sliding in easily where the vines have already stretched Tobirama open, and – oh –

“Anija,” he whimpers. “Anija – you’re – you’re _inside_ – you’ve never –”

It’s not really the first time he’s had his brother’s cock, not _really_ ; during their week together he’d learned to suck him, had him in his mouth while Madara rutted inside him, and certainly he’s had Hashirama’s fingers in him from well before then (that _horrible_ talk about the importance of masturbation in maintaining one’s health, fuck, the demonstration portion of that went on for hours and hours and he’s still mildly shell-shocked to this day about it) and Hashirama certainly _talked_ about doing this, but somehow, _somehow_ , the reality is still different.

“Fuck,” Madara says, and buries his face, red and hot, in Tobirama’s neck. “Oh, fuck, that shouldn’t be as hot as it is, _fuck_ , why does that do it for me –”

“You’re so _cute_ ,” Hashirama coos, even as he wraps his long arms around them both. He really is far too tall; he can make even Tobirama feel small. “Both of you, my precious people, so _cute_. Tobirama, make that cute little face again and say ‘please fuck me, anija’.”

Tobirama has no idea what face Hashirama’s referring to, but he needs to show that he can be good, too, the way Madara was being good earlier, so that Hashirama will be pleased with him, will praise him, too, so he obediently says, “Please fuck me, anija.”

Madara groans and stops holding still, starting to move, and Hashirama’s moving, too, and somehow this is nothing at all like the two vines from earlier, it’s less coordinated, less timed, and it’s so much better. Tobirama’s being tugged between them, as helpless as he was beneath the roots, being used by them, feeling their cocks rub up against each other inside of him, hearing Madara curse and Hashirama laugh and it’s so good, he loves it, he’s so _happy_ that he can do this for them when even a few weeks ago it would have seemed impossible.

“So good,” Hashirama says. “You’re so good, Tobirama, taking us both like this. Don’t you like it when we share?”

“Yes,” he gasps, and his voice is slurring as if he’s drunk, drunk on pleasure instead of sake. “Yes, yes, please, please share me, share me whenever you want, have me, _use_ me –”

“How are you this perfect,” Madara says, and his hands are tight on Tobirama’s hips and his chakra is metal-bright and warm on Tobirama’s tongue and he’s not even asking a question, not really, he really thinks that, he thinks Tobirama is perfect, _no one_ thinks that, no one but Hashirama.

And Madara, now.

“Anija, _please_ ,” he begs, because he can do that now, he’d forgotten somehow. “Please, I’ll be good for you, I won’t make you worry, please, just let me come, _please_ –”

“Us first,” Hashirama says, not without sympathy. “This is a punishment, after all.”

“ _Please_ , anija, I’ve learned better, I know better, I won’t, I’ll be good, just please –”

“No, Tobirama. Us first.”

“Don’t worry,” Madara grunts. “I’m not going to take long.”

He doesn’t, thankfully, and Hashirama loves seeing them after they’ve come, all fucked out and mindless and split open right down to the core, so he’s coming not much longer after that.

Tobirama can _feel_ them, both of them; feels them both pull out, their come dripping down his thighs and mingling together until it’s impossible to tell whose it is, and he’s sore and he’s hard and he whines, long and high, and finally, _finally_ , Hashirama has mercy on him, releasing him from the vines – all of them, even the ones that were stimulating him, and reaching down with an amused expression to push his fingers inside once again, coating them with his come, with Madara’s, and just thinking of that has Tobirama coming at last without any more help than that.

He’d be ashamed of himself, of how easy he is to please, except that he doesn’t have any space to feel anything other than pleasure and relief so sharp it almost hurts.

“Shh, shh,” Madara is saying, his hands running across Tobirama’s overheated body gently. “Come down, nice and slow, we’ve got you.”

Tobirama comes back down to earth, finding himself on the floor with Hashirama on one side and Madara on the other, and he doesn’t want to move a single muscle ever again.

“I think that was a good punishment,” Hashirama says, satisfied.

“Stop gloating and go to sleep,” Madara says, his eyes already heavily lidded. “Though I guess someone should probably go get some water to clean us up.”

Tobirama considers the possibility of someone _leaving_ right now, even for so short a time, and finds it unacceptable, so he lazily makes the signs one-handed and douses them all with warm water pulled from the humid air right outside their window.

“That,” Madara, now awake again and glaring, says, “was _not_ what I meant.”

Hashirama starts laughing.

Tobirama decides he doesn’t care – Madara still hasn’t left, after all, and the water was hot so really he has no basis to complain even if his hair will probably get a little tangled from it – and so he closes his eyes and goes to sleep, his brother’s laughter and his lover’s grumbling still ringing in his ears as he does.


	5. Future - Outsider POV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: what would happen in a dark!Hashi verse where Hashirama dies? 
> 
> A/N: Takes place well in the future compared to the other chapters

Senju Ryota was not a very distinctive man.

He did not mind this fact. On the contrary, he would happily describe himself as average in virtually every respect: a decent but not particularly notable fighter; a moderate earner who took on missions on a regular basis, neither slacking nor exceeding expectations; a man who married at the average age and had an average number of children.

Being average in an age marked by the appearance of legends, the gods of shinobi, might be disappointing for some people, but Senju Ryota did not mind.

After all, he was still alive.

This was much more of an achievement than those outside his clan might think.

His first clan leader was Butsuma, whose rabid hatred of the Uchiha clan, their traditional enemies, led him to take risks he should not have and who would violently crush any dissent.

His second clan leader was Hashirama, against whom no one wise even considered dissenting.

Hashirama, the first to inherit the Senju bloodline limit in several generations – who smiled as brightly as the sun, who was as powerful as a god, who loved his clan dearly and peace even more –

Who would kill you without so much as a blink if it suited him. 

(After all, everyone knew what had happened to Butsuma, even if they had no proof, though what good proof would have done them against such monstrous power he does not know.)

Senju Ryota had survived Butsuma by being lucky, and he survived under Hashirama by being average. He kept his head down and never questioned, supported his leader’s decision to create a village in alliance with their traditional enemies, smiled and said everything was fine and normal if ever he was asked.

Which he was, sometimes; the Uchiha had a pesky habit of poking at things that were better left unsaid. They learned better, eventually, and only a handful of new rose gardens appeared to line the streets of Konoha before that happened.

If he sometimes glanced at his leader and thought, in his heart of hearts, that the man’s brother had never had any chance at a normal life, a wife or husband and children of his own – that the Uchiha clan leader had lost some vital part of himself when his wild and free independence was broken – that certain taboos were not meant to be trifled with –

Well, those were thoughts, and everyone has thoughts, even average men, but average men who are just a little bit wise know better than to _speak_ those thoughts.

(After all, they slept in a bed made of wood under the watchful eye of the most powerful sensor in the world, and if that wasn’t bad enough, Uchiha Madara had not lost an iota of his fearsome temper.)

Senju Ryota was average, and did not make a fuss, and so he was alive.

He had survived Butsuma. He had not expected, in all honesty, to survive Hashirama.

But he did.

The news of their clan leader’s death spread like fire – Hashirama dead, the kill confirmed, the body brought back to the village for burial according to their customs – and, like many others of his clan, Senju Ryota did not know how to react. 

Dead?

Hashirama, _dead_? 

Surely not. Not that great man, who defeated the Uchiha and brought them all to peace, who tamed the bijuu, who broke the spirits of his enemies, whose influence shaped all their lives. How could he be dead?

But it was true.

He could see it on the numb features of Uchiha Madara, the way he moved as though he had been stabbed, the way his usually fluent speech broke and cracked whenever he said anything – which wasn’t much. That famous heart lit black flame was now all but extinguished by the depths of his loss. He tugged often at the detailed collar that he wore, which rumor said was a gift from Hashirama himself.

Senju Tobirama reacted, if anything, even worse. He had disappeared from the spot where he stood, his hiraishin activating, and he had not reappeared since then, leaving the entirety of the work of carrying on in Madara’s hands. He did not even reappear to attend the funeral, a grand state affair like none other, with respects (sent from a respectful distance) coming in from all over the world.

Funny – Senju Ryota would have thought Tobirama the one more likely to be named Nidaime, not Madara, as the former’s skill in administration by far exceeded the latter’s, even though the latter was notably more charismatic. But then, it was his brother, his last brother, his brother who dominated every last inch of his life, and anyway Tobirama had never been one to go public with his grief.

The village had lost their leader, but those two? They had lost the center of their lives.

Loss was far from unknown to shinobi, but somehow, somehow, it felt like they had never had a loss of this magnitude. 

And yet –

The village went onwards.

_Life_ went onwards. 

It had to.

Senju Ryota attended the meetings called by the entire village to discuss the matter of succession: Tobirama’s name was put forward, as was Madara’s, and several others besides in the event that those two would be unwilling to take up the mantle of Hokage.

Some people suggested that perhaps a co-leadership was in order, instead, to take advantage of each man’s strengths to compensate for the other’s weakness and furthermore to let them lean upon each other in their grief, and this was favored by a significant majority.

But before the official election could occur – Madara, on his own and on the absent Tobirama’s behalf, resisted and postponed, but even he could only do so much – he saw Tobirama walking out of his laboratory.

He was smiling.

The circles under his eyes had become more akin to gashes; his skin was grey and utterly colorless; he was thin as though he had forgotten to eat for months; the familiar red marks on his cheeks and chin had become accompanied by others; there were bandages apparent under his clothing suggesting injuries that had been neglected, or even potentially self-imposed –

But he was smiling: broadly, happily, with all evidence signs of pleasure. 

This was unusual enough, even before his brother’s loss, that Senju Ryota, despite his commitment to avoid all things of note, slowed his walk to gawk in wonder.

Madara was the next one to exit, and there were tears trailing down his face even as he laughed and pounded Tobirama on the shoulder in what appeared to be sincere joy.

And then –

No. 

_No_.

It could not be.

And yet – 

It was.

Hashirama.

Standing tall as ever, yes, but different, too. His face looked as though it had been recreated from clay and baked too quickly, resulting in cracks all over; his eyes were pitch black and empty, nothing but a single white dot in the very center to signify that the body contained a soul.

But the smile was his, a cheerful and infectious grin, and the way he threw his arms around his brother and his best friend was unmistakable.

It was him.

He was not alive.

“Ha, Ryota!” his clan leader called, spotting him across the way and nodding a greeting. “Guess what? Tobirama invented a resurrection technique, and robbed me back out of the Pure Lands right under the Shinigami’s nose! Isn’t my little brother wonderful?”

“Anija, please,” Tobirama said, ducking his head, abashed. “It’s hardly perfected yet; I will continue to improve on it.”

“I don’t know,” Madara countered. “A body that can’t die – untouchable by fire, water, earth or wind, by lightning or illusion, that neither feels hunger nor requires sleep – one that will never suffer the infirmities of age – it’s not that bad a starting place!”

“I have some ideas on returning the ability to eat and sleep,” Tobirama said. “It should at least be optional.”

“We have time,” Hashirama laughed. “Thanks to you, we have all the time in the world!”

And Senju Ryota knew, with a sinking feeling in his heart, that what his leader – once former, now forever – had said was true.

He had all the time in the world.

As for the world itself, though –

Senju Ryota belatedly realized that he was very, very afraid.

No amount of being average was going to save him this time. 

_No one_ was going to be saved, this time.


	6. Punishment/Reward

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hashirama/Madara time

There comes a time in a man's life when he has to think about the choices.

About what it was that led him to where he is now.

For Madara, where he is now happens to be hiding behind a dango stall so that Izuna doesn’t find him.

So, really, what even _is_ his life right now?

He feels like he knew, once, but then things just sort of _happened_.

First there was war, then there wasn’t, and then there was all of the negotiations to start the village and spending every minute feeling like the elders were going to stab him in the back for it, followed shortly by the even greater stresses of actually setting up a cohesive ninja village, and then all of a sudden there was Hashirama coming up behind him, darkness, confusion, _kidnapping_ – and then _Tobirama_ , beautiful earnest Tobirama who still didn’t know about the kidnapping portion of their first real encounter and never would as far as Madara was concerned, and, fuck, he can barely even think the man’s name without a frisson running up his spine, which he supposes is what happens after several weeks of, just, _constant_ sex.

And Hashirama –

Madara very carefully does not think about how he feels about his lifelong best friend and former enemy right now. If he does, he might think about the curl of heat in his belly and shaking cold in his fingertips; think of how terribly he loves him – has always loved him – and how he’s afraid of him, too; think how somehow in his mind all of those battles that never went anywhere meant that he categorized Hashirama as something safe and now even with proof that he’s incredibly _not_ he still can’t quite break that habit; and think, too, of that overwhelming feeling of debt, of course, _always_ debt and gratitude for saving Madara’s heart and mind from turning to ash and all Hashirama ever asked in return was to make all Madara’s dreams come true –

That’s why Izuna can’t find him.

There is _no way_ Madara is explaining what’s going on between him and the Senju brothers to Izuna.

Izuna, who Tobirama so very nearly killed –

Izuna, who Hashirama saved.

The curse of the Sharingan: Madara remembers the exact moment when he heard the shout and saw Izuna fall, stricken, Tobirama finally coming out the victor of what he had always privately and irrationally thought would be an eternal stalemate.

He remembers abandoning everything – the mission, the battlefield, even whatever members of his clan that could not keep up – to get Izuna back home and into the care of the medics.

He remembers how sick he felt when the medics told him there was nothing they could do to save Izuna from Tobirama’s well-aimed strike and how Izuna’s attempt to dodge had earned him nothing more than a slower death.

He remembers the black rage that consumed him when the sentry ran in, shouting that the Senju had taken the almost unimaginable step of attacking the Uchiha compound itself.

He remembers the way that rage had turned him almost rabid, feral as a wild dog, when he’d run outside and seen Tobirama standing there – distant, cold, merciless as he always is on the battlefield – with what appeared to be a masked army at his back, saying that he’d heard that the job he’d done was incomplete and that he’d come to finish it.

A lie, of course.

A good lie, though; it’d done the job: Madara, maddened, had bellowed in his rage, ordering every able-bodied Uchiha to attack, all at once. And Tobirama was so incredibly fast that it’d taken a good ten minutes before their strikes actually started landing and they’re realized that the whole army, Tobirama and the masked men all, were nothing more than those damnable shadow clones because apparently he’d figured out a new twist to the technique that let him make incredibly large numbers of them.

They’d rushed back to the compound the second they’d realized that the ‘attack’ was a feint, but by then Hashirama and Tobirama (the real one) had infiltrated to Izuna’s sickbed, Hashirama healing him and Tobirama keeping watch, and Madara had barely burst into the room when Tobirama had used his hiraishin to spirit the two of them away to safety, leaving behind a healed Izuna and a single kunai piercing their wall, holding up a scroll reading “We trust we’ve made our point” and listing a date and time for peace talks.

Madara really should have realized that Hashirama must be insane back then.

(Before, he’d imagined that Hashirama reacted to Tobirama’s near-kill with anger and grief, shouting that Tobirama robbed him of his best hope of peace with Madara, killing once and for all that dream born by the riverbank, and demanded that Tobirama accompany him to the Uchiha compound to help fix what he had wrought. Now that he knows Hashirama a little better, he thinks it went differently: Hashirama pulling his brother into his arms, whispering praise, and saying, “I’m glad you didn’t kill him immediately. I know _just_ how we’re going to use this.”

And if, sometimes, Madara wonders whether Tobirama’s deadly strike landed true on his brother’s orders…well, Izuna still lives, even if his lungs are a little weaker than they once were, and now they have peace, so surely the ends justify the means and it would be wrong of him to question how it was all achieved. Right?)

In short, there is no _fucking_ way he’s telling Izuna about the exact nature of his current relationship with the Senju brothers, no matter how many times Izuna bothers him about how “altered” his behavior has been since that week he went on that so-called mission with the two of them.

Besides, multiple other people in the clan have told Madara that the entire clan finds him infinitely more tolerable now that he's happier and more relaxed, and if they'd realized that getting laid by a Senju on a regular basis was what it took they would have kidnapped one ages ago.

So Izuna can’t _really_ be concerned. He’s probably just fishing for details to help him win that damnable betting pool regarding which Senju, exactly, Madara is banging, and in what configuration.

Not that anyone in the betting pool has actually guessed right.

Madara doesn’t blame them. He and Hashirama mutually thought of each other as best friends throughout all these long years of war, and they met on a regular basis on the battlefield – if _he_ hadn’t been able to figure out that Hashirama, in addition to being the extremely cheerful, emotional, childish, optimistic, and endlessly hopeful man that he is, is also a sadistic psychopath with a matchless ruthless streak, well, what hope did everyone else have?

Even _Izuna_ thinks of Hashirama as “the nice one”, and he’s in line to be named co-head of the village’s new merged T&I division alongside the head of the Yamanaka clan once the negotiations of their assimilation in to the village is complete.

(To be perfectly honest, Madara’s own greatest contribution to village unity may very well have been recommending that Hashirama take Izuna instead of Tobirama as his aide for some of the peace talks with clans they’d determined would be necessary to be part of the village. Izuna’s most staunch protests against the creation of Konoha has always concerned leaving the defense of the Uchiha clan in the hands of people he didn’t consider adequate, and while Madara’s not actually sure what happened during those peace talks, Izuna _did_ come back with a slight green tinge to his face and significantly fewer concerns about Hashirama’s willingness to do what must be done if necessary.

And with even Izuna now firmly on the side of integration, the remaining dissenting voices were quickly silenced – thought whether Izuna's good faith in the village will survive finding out the exact details of what his beloved older brother has gotten himself into...

Well, probably best not to test it.)

On the other hand, there’s missing Hashirama’s well-hidden madness, which Madara can’t blame anyone for, and then there’s just being stupid. Madara’s _heard_ what ridiculous rumors are going around about him and Hashirama – all gooey romance and hand-holding, childhood romance divided by family strife and reunited at last through Hashirama’s perseverance and hope – and he knows it’s not _his_ public demeanor that invites such speculation.  How shinobi who have been on the same battlefield as the Senju, sometimes in opposition to them, forget that their precious God of Shinobi is in fact a shinobi, Madara’s not sure, but they definitely have.

Still, it's better than what they say about Tobirama.

( _cold, harsh, soulless, disdainful and jealous of his brother’s affection for Madara, untrusting of the Uchiha, full of bitterness and hatred, intent on poisoning their precious peace from within_ )

Tobirama: beautiful, earnest, well-meaning, _broken_ Tobirama, whose mind Hashirama has so thoroughly molded to his own purposes that Madara despairs of ever being able to explain even something so simple as how unusual ( _wrong_ ) their relationship with Hashirama is.

Tobirama, who tries so hard and does so much that no one sees, who is more or less single-handly building the foundation for Madara and Hashirama's dream village, who can perfectly read a person's body for the purposes of battle but fails to even start to understand their minds for the purposes of peace. Whose inability to speak in anything but the sternest tones makes people overlook him as heartless and cruel, when in truth he is anything but.

(Tobirama loves as deeply as any Uchiha, with all the pain that comes with it, but whom everyone treats as if he is too strong to feel such things – Madara, whose clan should really know better than to misjudge him but still does it, understands being in that position better than anyone.)

Sure, Madara has only had his own eyes opened about Tobirama recently – he’d been as vile as the rest of them before, blaming Tobirama for what Hashirama did, for what he didn’t do, for everything, making him the village scapegoat just because he didn’t smile – but now that he’s aware, he's determined to put a stop to it. He never could stand people who failed to appreciate what they had by holding them to impossible standards; he’d put a stop to any comparisons between himself and Izuna at once, harshly, and to see Tobirama retreating further and further into himself, languishing in Hashirama’s shadow, causes him an almost physical pain.

Now that he sees it, and now that he does he sees it everywhere, he's decided that he will burn anyone who dares think of Tobirama as the lesser just because he's not Hashirama, even when - _especially_ when - Tobirama would never think to question it.

...Hashirama probably factored that into his plans, too.

Damn strategists. People in the village joke about Tobirama being part Nara, all quiet reserve and brilliant mind and concern for the troublesome, but it took discovering that Hashirama _also_ has that clan’s notorious ability to see all the steps necessary to reach their goals, as famous if not more so than their shadows, to convince Madara that there might be some truth to the rumor.

After all, look at where they are now.

Everything Hashirama wants, he has: a village of peace, a ban on military action by children, power enough to protect his last living brother –

Even Madara.

(Madara's hardly the only Uchiha to be attracted to the Senju brothers - there's been an active black market in suggestive pictures made of convincing henges more or less ever since the day they came of age - but his position as Hashirama's (former) best friend had given him particular reason to daydream. But none of his much-exercised fantasies had prepared him for the reality that Hashirama would not just want him, which he'd barely dare hope, but would want to _own_ him, a greedy and possessive and all-encompassing love that Madara really, truly shouldn't find nearly as hot as he does.)

Almost as if summoned by his thoughts, Madara feels the tightening around his throat that means that Hashirama wants him to come home.

He reaches up and tugs at his neck, scowling.

Damn collar.

Damn Hashirama, too, for using a promise made in a moment of weakness to convince Madara to put the collar on without clarifying that it then _wouldn't come off_.

Woven with the most precise use of the Mokuton Madara has ever seen Hashirama use, the collar is a gorgeous swirl of brown roots and branches, green vines, red and yellow leaves, so fine and delicate that it looks like embroidery.

Madara knows it does, because after two of the village's leading shinobi simultaneously began wearing them, disguised as adornment sewn into their outfits (and the fact that Tobirama was similarly collared was not as comforting as Hashirama might think, given that Madara knows perfectly well that Tobirama would do anything Hashirama wanted no matter how foolish), the _whole damn village_ picked up the trend.

The Konoha collar, they're calling it. Ridiculous.

Hashirama probably planned _that_ , too, or maybe it’s just the universe loving him so much that it gives him unlooked-for gifts in the form of good luck. Now his entire village has unknowingly adopted the symbol of Hashirama's dominion, and all because they think it’s _fashionable_. 

As Madara said: _ridiculous_.

And given how ridiculous it is, Madara _really_ shouldn’t find the memory of Hashirama, eyes dark with lust and possessiveness and no small amount of madness, murmuring as he fixed the collar into place that it would help him make sure that nothing would ever part them again as damnably hot as he does. It’s a wound that’s lingered in Madara’s heart, too, ever since that day by the river, and knowing that Hashirama feels as strongly as he does, however he expresses it, soothes something in him that he didn’t even know needed soothing.

(He’s still not sure about how he feels about the idea of being owned, though somehow it’s only taken Hashirama a month of repeated positive reinforcement to convince Madara’s cock that the idea’s not half bad and definitely not worth objecting to. Not that Madara would let himself be ruled by his sexual desires, of course, but given the near-celibate state that his high rank and the respect of his clan has boxed him into for years on end, they are rather persuasive…)

Maybe he would object more if Tobirama hadn’t been collared at the same time – collared like an animal by his own damn brother, on his knees with the ecstasy of the converted in his eyes like a painting that Madara has seared forever into his brain with his Sharingan, and no matter how much he knows better, Madara still somehow expects every time he sees Tobirama wearing the collar that Tobirama will suddenly realize that this is all twisted and wrong, that no matter how beautiful the two Senju look together there is a power imbalance between them that will never be fixed. But that will never happen: the depth of the brainwashing involved here will take years to fix, if fixing it is even possible.

(If Madara could only think about the collaring _logically_ , he might be able to convince himself that it’s unacceptable, but thinking about the collar makes him think of Hashirama and Tobirama and  _things_ that mean that he’s basically ended up jerking off at least once a day to those thoughts for the last _month_ and clearly thinking logically just isn’t going to happen until he gets this whole thing out of his system and his libido under control again. He’s sure that’ll happen. At some point. Surely…)

The only good thing that had come out of the stupid collars, in Madara’s opinion, was how the fashionable popularity of the collars in Konoha ended up sparking the idea for one of Tobirama’s most brilliant ideas to date, and given that Tobirama and brilliance are practically synonymous, that was really saying something.

Using Hashirama’s usual inattention to detail as cover, Tobirama snuck through a law allowing certain Hokage-approved products to be sold without any tax burden on either seller or buyer, thus significantly reducing the price and increasing the profit, and worked with the village merchants to encourage the sale of Konoha ‘souvenirs’ to civilians from across the land. Once the Council – Tobirama had insisted on their having one, represented by elders from each clan that joined, and while Madara had originally doubted that democracy was really applicable to shinobi, the existence of the Council had turned out to be a major selling point in convincing more clans to join the village now that they knew their opinions would be heard – found out about it, mostly when their budget for new works had decreased due to receiving less tax, they protested it as foolish and self-indulgent waste.

Well, they’d protested right up until Tobirama explained that each necklace or keychain or pacifier or whatever had been stamped, among other decorative features, with one of his Hiraishin marks, thereby giving him - and whatever listening devices or bombs he carried with him – immediate access to villages and clan compounds across the land that he would never have been able to access otherwise.

(Madara is so very, very glad that they’re no longer at war with the Senju, especially since by the time Tobirama got around to explaining his plan several dozen of the stupid things had already gotten lost somewhere inside the new Uchiha compound. Izuna had been _incredibly_ pissed off at the unfathomable breach in security.)

The collar gives another squeeze, harder this time, and that cuts off Madara’s daydreaming.

"I'm coming, I'm coming," Madara grumbles – and given what a summons by collar like this usually means, he has reason to expect that he will very soon be _coming_ in a different sort of way – and peeks around the side of the stall to confirm that he’s lost Izuna.

With that confirmed, he nods at the highly amused stall owner – a civilian, though one who managed to keep such a straight face that Madara thinks he might be a spy – and dashes up the side of the nearest building to make a beeline towards Hashirama's house.

Their house, he supposes, given that he shares it with the two Senju brothers with the official reason being that it’s more convenient for them to be near the village’s administrative center, but really, it’s Hashirama’s house.

Everything in that house belongs to Hashirama, but most _especially_ its other two residents.

(Madara wishes he wasn’t the sort of person who was turned on by the methods Hashirama considered appropriate in disciplining his younger brother, particularly after that research spree of his, but, unfortunately, he really, really is. If only Tobirama wasn't so beautiful and so broken, so lovely in his obedience, in his need, in his pleas for mercy, then maybe Madara wouldn't want him so badly that he'd agree to anything if only to get more of him –)

The second Madara passes the threshold, his collar tightens pointedly in a way that he’s learned means that no one else is home that Hashirama's got something planned.

Which means wearing clothing is not allowed.

Madara licks his suddenly dry lips - why does he _like_ this? - and gets himself undressed, leaving only the collar in place.

He heads first to the bedroom, his cock already hard in anticipation, but oddly enough, Hashirama’s not there.

He’s in the office. Actually working, no less.

“Tobirama, there’s no need to wear a henge when we’re at home,” Madara drawls, even those his sensor abilities make it clear that it is, in fact, Hashirama sitting there – even if the fact that he’s sitting at the ridiculous ‘walking’ desk no one else can use wasn’t enough to give him away.

Hashirama looks up at him with a blinding smile, waving the desk away so he can rise to his feet.

“Good, you’re here,” he says, coming over. “I got you a present.”

Madara has exactly one second to feel a distinct sense of foreboding – even without the Sharingan, one learns to get a feel for these sorts of things – and then Hashirama plops something on top of his head.

“…are those _cat ears_?!”

“They are! I saw them in the marketplace today and thought of you,” Hashirama says, apparently oblivious to Madara’s growing incredulousness. “Just like that prickly stray that hangs around the fish shop –”

“Hashirama. I am not a cat.”

“Of course you are,” Hashirama says, settling his hands on Madara’s shoulders. He’s still smiling. “You’re anything I say you are.”

And then something burns on the back of Madara’s neck, snapping his chakra shut so quickly that he can’t breathe for a moment and the pressure of Hashirama’s hands grows and he falls to his knees –

Right onto a pillow.

“See?” Hashirama says, sounding smug. “My good little kitty.”

“Since when,” Madara wheezes, ignoring how nice it feels when Hashirama’s fingers gently knead his shoulders and ignoring even harder how hard his cock still is, “can you attach chakra suppression seals to the Mokuton?”

“Tobirama –”

“Say no more.” Madara’s not even surprised. Hashirama probably hadn’t even needed to _ask_ , he could have just smiled faintly at the thought of surprising Madara like this and Tobirama would have set to work immediately. Hashirama has Tobirama remarkably well –

Madara swallows.

 _Trained_.

That's different, though, he argues to himself. Tobirama doesn’t know what freedom is, while Madara has not only been free but clan head, commander of dozens of soldiers, for years; he’s agreeing to Hashirama’s nonsense because it apparently appeals to some sort of bizarre sexual urges that he was previously unaware of. He might be submitting, but he’s still in control.

He can walk away any time.

“Oh, Madara, look! I also found this.”

Madara stares.

Right before his eyes, Hashirama is dangling what appears to be a small plush mouse.

“No,” Madara says flatly.

“You should play with it. It’s a _present_.”

Madara sees red. What the hell is Hashirama up to? Humiliation games are what he plays with _Tobirama_ , not with Madara; those games have certainly been enjoyable to watch (and experience) but _Madara_ definitely isn’t into that sort of thing –

Hashirama’s hand moves to his hair and _pulls_ , yanking Madara’s head backwards to look up at him.

Madara’s cock gives a traitorous twitch. None of his other lovers have ever been brave enough to play with his hair, even though it’s _right there_ and somewhat unavoidable; thus far all of his exploration in that direction has happened, by necessity, on his own.

This is different from those little games he designed for himself: more unpredictable, more dangerous. Hashirama’s strong, physically as well as in terms of pure power, and there’s a certain thrill in knowing that the fingers tangled through his hair could probably pick him up and throw him if they so wished. A thrill in being helpless, on his knees, and yet knowing that his life is in no real danger – Hashirama loves him, madly and desperately, and he’s not going to kill him, though he might be willing to hurt him, as evidenced by the further little _tug_ on Madara’s hair.

…it's _much_ better than doing it to himself.

“You’re being ungrateful, kitty,” Hashirama murmurs. “And here I go to all this trouble to get you a nice present, and you won’t even try it out? That’s not very nice.”

Madara shouldn’t find this hot. He’s not a child, he’s not Tobirama; he’s never enjoyed being _disciplined_. If anything, it always drove him mad when his father or the elders meted it out; he hated it with an unruly passion that he never failed to express. He should jump to his feet right now and storm out of the room in an angry huff, that’s what he should do.

And then –

And then Hashirama might never do this again.

Might never look at him with those eyes gone dark, that little hint of a smile hiding behind his best attempt at a stern expression (it’s not very convincing); might never put his hands in Madara’s hair and _pull_ just the way Madara’s always secretly hoped that someone would –

…Madara maintains that this is a very stupid game that Hashirama’s playing, but maybe it’s worth giving it a shot.

But on his _own_ terms, to remind Hashirama that Madara’s here of his own free will and not by coercion, that no matter what they play at when it comes to games of ownership, at the end of the day they’re still best friends and _equals_.

Madara looks up at Hashirama from his position on his knees and smirks, ignoring how dry his lips are. “And what’re you going to do about that?”

Hashirama’s face breaks out in a giant grins in response.

Next thing Madara knows – what is _with_ these Senju, do they ever stop training their speed? – Hashirama’s sitting on the floor and Madara’s lying over his lap.

Madara has that second of foreboding again, except this time he knows exactly what’s going to happen and he’s _not_ okay with it. Hashirama couldn’t seriously expect him to agree to be –

Hashirama’s hand comes down right on Madara’s ass.

“What the _fuck_ , Hashirama –”

Hashirama hits him again, and Madara yelps in surprise. This isn’t the piddling little impact play he’s managed to talk at least one particularly brave lover into, where every strike is half-hearted at best – Hashirama’s really putting his back into it. And given that Hashirama is built like the trees he can summon with a thought, with thighs and arms as massive as oaks, with all the power that suggests behind his blows even before he adds chakra, that’s really saying something.

It makes Madara think of the battlefield: the way his blood is on fire, adrenaline pumping through his heart when he sees Hashirama across a field, knowing that in only a moment they would clash with an impact so powerful it would rattle his teeth, matching that terrible strength with his own. The way they would be abandoned by their clans, all wise enough to know to get out of the way when titans walked the earth and gods met in the fury of war; the way it sometimes felt, through the fog of smoke and fog, as if they were alone together, caught in an endless battle that went on forever.

Makes him think, guiltily, of those secret dreams he sometimes had that twisted the Sharingan-clear memories of those battles into something else, something darker. Some where he finally took advantage of Hashirama’s hesitancy to gain the upper hand, forcing his friend to his knees – and of other dreams, even more secret, where it was Hashirama who won, unleashed at last, and forced him down in turn, right there in the battlefield with all of his clan around, their Sharingan-red eyes glowing through the fog, _watching_ , searing the sight of their defeated leader into their memories forever –

Madara whimpers and thrashes without actually trying to escape, his cock rutting against Hashirama’s thick thigh as the other man strikes again, setting up an unpredictable rhythm that is occasionally broken up by reaching out to give Madara’s hair another purposeful tug.

It’s so _good_.

No one else would ever dare do anything like this. No one would even dare think of it – to put the fearsome leader of the Uchiha over their knee and _spank_ him like he’s a disobedient child? It’s unthinkable.

“You really should be more open-minded,” Hashirama says. His tone is as mild and unaffected as if he were remarking on a new restaurant opening in the village, albeit one that he’s looking forward to trying out, like Madara isn’t rutting against his lap and can’t feel how hard Hashirama is. “I’m your Hokage, now. You should trust me to make good decisions for you.”

“Hashirama –”

“Shh. Good kitties don’t talk, not if they’re going to say mean things. They’re only allowed to say good things. You can be a good kitty for me, right?”

Hashirama’s free hand settles in Madara’s hair, right next to those ridiculous ears, and starts very purposefully stroking, sometimes with a fierce tug interspersed.

At no point does his other hand stop coming down, even though Madara’s ass has got to be bright red by now.

Madara groans and grinds down, seeking more pressure. This position isn’t good enough.

“Well? Are you?”

Madara grinds down some more.

Hashirama stops moving.

Someone makes an absolutely pathetic, wretched whining sound, full of denied need.

Madara has the sinking feeling that it was him.

“Well, Madara? Tell me you’re a good little kitty for me and I’ll give you a reward.”

No way. Absolutely _no way_. Hashirama might be very good at figuring out Madara’s most secret desires, but there is absolutely no way that Madara would ever –

Hashirama’s fingers trace, very lightly, over Madara’s ass.

Madara shivers.

The fingers dip lower, still gentle, still delicate, not enough pressure to actually do anything other than tease, and there’s the slightest little pressure against Madara’s hole, but then they’re pulling away and Hashirama is sighing and unfolding his legs like he’s actually thinking of getting up and going back to _work_ and –

“I can be a good kitty,” Madara blurts out, and he feels his face go scarlet. He didn’t actually just say that. He _didn’t_. It’s some sort of genjutsu, clearly, to make him _think_ he’s said that, meant to torture him.

“What’s that?” Hashirama says, the kindness in his voice only a mask for his cruelty. “A good little kitty, you say? For who?”

“For – for you,” Madara manages to spit out, twisting to hide his face in Hashirama’s belly because he can’t bear himself right now, horribly shamed but perversely grateful that Hashirama isn’t making him say _that_ again. “Hashirama, _please_ –”

Hashirama’s fingers come back, this time pressing in confidently, slicked up and stretching him and Madara starts wiggling again, hoping that this time he’ll get enough stimulation to actually come –

Something presses into him, and it’s _not_ fingers.

Hashirama laughs, a little chuckle that Madara only ever hears from him in the bedroom – satisfied and pleased and more than a little turned on.

Madara twists to look and then he can feel his face go red again.

It’s a _tail_.

Well, on the outside, anyway; the inside is wood carved into a familiar shape ( _very_ familiar, actually – Tobirama? Seriously? If Hashirama wasn’t able to create his own sex toys by waving his hands, Madara wouldn’t be able to go anywhere near the woodcarvers ever again lest he die of embarrassment), pressing into him in all the best ways, but the outside is long and soft, silk threads meant to mimic fur wrapped around a thin wooden core so that Hashirama can make the tail move through the air before wrapping around Madara’s thigh and giving a little squeeze.

“What a good kitty I have,” Hashirama coos. “What a sight you make. Look at yourself, Madara.”

He pulls Madara’s hair again, purposefully this time, dragging Madara out of his lap and back to a kneeling position on that cushion from earlier and crap, there’s a _mirror_ there, since when is there a mirror there?

A mirror showing Madara in all his shame, no less: naked but for the cat ears and matching tail, the collar around his neck, and the hard cock that shows anyone looking how much he’s enjoying his own degradation.

“If only the rest of your clan could see you now,” Hashirama says, and Madara shudders, shutting his eyes but unable to blot out the sight of himself. “Their Madara-sama, fearsome and mighty, able to match anyone in the battlefield – what would they think of you now, on your knees for me? A good little kitty for me?”

Madara would like to say he recoils from the thought, humiliating to the extreme, but he doesn’t; he just wants to come. He could, too: Hashirama hasn’t bound his cock in any way, for once, and that means he could just reach over and –

Hashirama catches his hands and wraps something around them, winding it around his fingers and up to his forearms. Something thin and weak, nothing that would actually keep Madara back if he wasn’t willing – another way to show him that this is happening with his compliance, no matter how much he wishes he could blame coercion for his participation in this – and Madara doesn’t look but he has the distinct suspicion that it’s _yarn_.

“Now, kitty, you’re going to be good for me,” Hashirama says, and he really does stand up, pulling Madara’s head in until his face is pressed up against Hashirama’s still-clothed cock, rubbing against it like he really is some sort of obscene parody of a cat. “You’re going to be very good.”

Madara hates how much he likes it when Hashirama compliments him. No one ever did, not like this; he had to fight and sweat and bleed for any praise he ever managed to get from his clan elders or, worse, his father, and Hashirama hands it out like it’s nothing, sweet loving words falling from his lips at the slightest sign of obedience.

(Sometimes Madara thinks he can see why Tobirama bends so quickly to Hashirama’s will. It’s terribly seductive, that praise, the warmth of approval in Hashirama’s eyes.)

That’s probably what makes him agree without words, letting Hashirama settle in one of those stupid chairs he’s always making (the one he was using when Madara first came in is _right there_ ) and opening his mouth to take Hashirama’s cock, letting it sit heavy on his tongue, a now-familiar taste of heat and flesh.

He thinks he knows what Hashirama wants – imagines himself licking at Hashirama’s cock and mewling like a kitten, and feels the flush rise in his cheeks – but when he starts to suck Hashirama weaves a hand into his hair and gives him a little tug, making him stop.

“That’s very nice of you to offer, Madara,” Hashirama says. “But I really need to get some work done, or Tobirama will kill me. Just hold on a little and I’ll get right back to you.”

And somehow that’s even _more_ humiliating: he’s just sitting there, kneeling on a cushion with his still-stinging ass on his ankles, tail curled up around him and pressing inside of him, with his mouth around Hashirama’s cock and not even _doing_ anything.

Hashirama’s stupid walking desk comes over and stops right over his head, like Hashirama really is planning on doing paperwork while using Madara as – as some sort of cock warmer, a toy for his pleasure, and the very thought makes Madara _burn_.

Not, as much as he would like, in a bad way.

“Shh,” Hashirama says, and the hand in Madara’s hair starts carding through it. “I’ll be right with you. Just a little patience. You can be patient, can’t you?”

That hits right in an old, sore spot: Madara’s never been patient, _never_ , and the elders of his clan are always lecturing him about it. Too brash, too impulsive, not thoughtful enough – they don’t believe him when he tells them that he knows how to lie in wait, how to hold his strike until the right moment, and no matter how many infiltration or assassination missions he takes, they never change in that belief.

He knows he’s playing right into Hashirama’s hands by not fighting him, not demanding that they do more right now, but this position feels strangely good – hand in his hair, cock warm in mouth and cool in his ass, the comedown from the adrenaline of a strike – and anyway, there’s no way Hashirama can possibly make him wait _that_ long.

So he sits there, waiting, and things start to – drift, almost.

His mind goes quiet, almost peaceful, and it’s almost like the feeling of waiting for an assassination target to get into place, anticipation but somehow muted. There’s nothing for him to think about right now: no clan business to attend to, no irritating questions about his stability from the Council, no missions to plan or shinobi to worry about, no politics…nothing.

Nothing but the warmth between his lips and the hand in his hair.

“I knew you’d make a good kitty, Madara,” Hashirama is saying somewhere very far away. “Isn’t it nice? Cats don’t worry about anything. You don’t need to worry about anything. It’s all being taken care of. Everything’s in good hands: your village, your clan, your family. Everything’s fine. Everything’s good. You don’t need to think about it. You can just be. Just lie in the sun, warm and happy and mine. Isn’t that good?”

Madara lazily hums in agreement, barely aware that he’s doing it.

He’s not sure how much time passes and he finds he doesn’t really care. He’s always thought he wasn’t made for peace, no matter how much he longed for it; always suspected, in the dark hours of the night before the dawn, that even if he one day built the village of his dreams that it would never be enough for him. That he’d always be restless, unsatisfied; that a man built to the specifications of endless war would never be able to learn what it means to be at peace, not really, not in his heart – that he’d end up a relic, a warmonger among those too tired for war, paranoid and alone and watching everyone around him settle into peace in a way he could never hope to match.

But those fears are gone, now: he’s as peaceful as the heart of a banked fire, his overactive mind finally at ease. No worries, no fears, nothing to do but be – knowing in his heart that everything is fine, that even if anything happens Hashirama will deal with it, and able to just _rest_. At last.

He can finally release the burdens that have rested on his shoulders since that terrible day by the riverside when the weight of his duty crashed down upon him, since even before then, since the day he first understood what it meant that he was the heir. To be an older brother, in a clan at war.

(He wonders for a moment if Hashirama has trapped him in some sort of genjutsu, since he can’t use his chakra right now to dispel or even check, but surely no one would use one for such a pointless little game as this.)

“You’re doing so well,” Hashirama tells him, even as he keeps working, the soft sound of brush on paper on the table above Madara’s head just barely audible, lulling Madara further into the hazy doze he’s in. “So good. I knew you’d be good, but you’re doing even better than I dreamed you would. Such a good kitty. Good little kitty –”

He says more in that vein, lots more, and Madara just lets it drift over him, the words soothing and his mind blank, ignoring the minor physical discomforts of the position – his ass still sore, the collar pressing around his throat, his jaw going stiff even as he drools all over Hashirama’s cock, unable to wipe it away, his own cock heavy and hard between his legs – in favor of that wonderful feeling of floating.

It’s so very hard to disagree with Hashirama when he feels this good. Feels this _free_.

It’s really not that bad, being a cat.

Being _Hashirama_ ’s cat.

Not if that means he can let go of all his troubles and sit here, listening to whispers of praise, and know that for once in his life he’s fulfilling and even exceeding every expectation of him.

“Very good,” Hashirama says. “You did such a good job, Madara; I’m all done with the paperwork now. You can have your reward now.”

When Madara doesn’t respond, still distant as though everything is happening through a pane of glass, Hashirama puts his hands in Madara’s hair and starts to move his head for him, fucking his mouth in little gentle gestures that slowly, ever so slowly, bring Madara back down to earth.

He comes, eventually, and Madara swallows it all down, obediently using his tongue to clean Hashirama’s cock after, licking him up just like a good kitty should. When Hashirama gives him his foot and leg to use to get off, not even bothering to use his hands or his mouth or even his Mokuton to get Madara off but just leaving Madara to rut against him like an animal, Madara is appropriately grateful.

“You’re so good,” Hashirama tells him, again and again, his fingers still warm in Madara’s hair. “Being so good, all for me. This is what you get when you let me take care of you. Isn’t it better like this? Such a good kitty.”

Madara comes, awash in sensation and pleasure, and doesn’t even think to complain when Hashirama’s next orders are for him to take a nap in the bed in the corner, the one that’s right under the high window that’s only small enough to let in light and not visitors, that lets him soak up the warm afternoon light as Hashirama takes care of all the necessary business, cleaning him up with a nice warm cloth before settling back in at the desk to continue the important work of caring for the village they’ve made together.

It doesn’t even occur to Madara to remove the ears or the tail.

He’s a good kitty.

(He wakes up four hours later, realizes he’s late for dinner with Izuna and the Uchiha elders and trips over himself three times while getting ready even as Hashirama laughs at him, but something of that peace remains with him even later that night, lets him smile at Izuna and laugh at his leading questions and tell him without explaining anything that everything is just fine, Izuna, don’t worry so much, nothing has changed.

Everything is just fine.)


	7. Punishment 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For a prompt by une-amie: Tobirama has a hard time understanding social interactions, so how about something where Tobirama encourages someone else’s attention without meaning to, and Tobirama gets punished? Also, Tobirama getting spanked + figging

In Tobirama’s defense, he wasn’t actually _listening_ to what the man was saying.

(It’s not that he thinks that defense is going to help him any now, but really, truly, he _wasn’t_.)

It’d been an extremely long day of negotiations by that point, and between Hashirama’s smiling inability to take no for an answer and Madara’s hot temper and paranoia, the vast bulk of negotiating the details of the treaty governing the joining of the village by what has got to be Fire Country’s most punctilious clan inevitably fell on Tobirama and Izuna. 

If Tobirama never sees another Hyuuga again, it would probably be too soon, but horribly enough they still have another two days of negotiations to go.

In the interests of preserving their respective sanities, Tobirama reached an agreement with Izuna that they would swap off attendance at the parties that were being held each night (the parties were a crucial part of negotiations, designed to show off Konoha’s wealth and strength, but also incredibly exhausting when you _also_ needed to review that day’s adjustments to the treaty with a fine-toothed comb to make sure Hashirama hasn’t given away a mountain again). Tonight was Tobirama’s night, much to his displeasure; when Izuna picked which days he wanted to attend, he’d clearly calculated in advance for the fact that it would be a festival night, and thus the party five times as large. 

And, when Tobirama complained, Izuna had smugly pointed out that it still made sense to do it the way he’d suggested, as he had a special someone that he wanted to spend the festival with and Tobirama did not. 

Which – fine. Whatever. 

(Given how universally terrible his reputation in the village seems to be, apparently no matter what he does, Tobirama recently started strongly encouraging the perception that Hashirama and Madara were in a quasi-secret relationship with each other alone, ensuring that the rumor mill took him out of the equation. So, really, it isn’t a surprise that Izuna thinks so, too, even though Tobirama might’ve hoped that Madara would at least have told his brother about him. But it’s fine, really; by now Tobirama really should’ve gotten used to being too unimportant to mention.)

Tobirama comforted himself privately with the knowledge that it wasn’t like Madara and Hashirama weren’t going to be stuck at the party too, anyway, so he’d still be able to spend the festival with them. 

As it happened, however, while they were both in attendance at the party, Hashirama somehow manage to goad both Madara and the Hyuuga clan head into a drinking contest, leading to Tobirama avoiding the whole lot of them. 

That’s probably how he ended lurking in the corner, politely not-listening as Hyuuga Gorou, a large looming sort of Hyuuga with a round face, rambled on about something or another. 

The conversation definitely started with comments regarding on that day’s negotiations, he remembers that much; Gorou had some minor ministerial role helping manage Hyuuga finances and clearly thought of himself as rather important, which Tobirama might’ve been more likely to believe if not for the Caged Bird seal on his forehead, when everyone knew the important decisions were made by the main family. 

That seal ended up being the crux of the problem, in fact: Tobirama’d never gotten a chance to examine the Caged Bird at any length, but with Gorou standing quite so close and having already drunk several cups of sake already, dulling his senses, it didn’t seem like that big a deal to sneak some glances at the seal once every few moments to try to figure more of it out.

This, as he was later informed, was a Mistake. 

Seriously, how was Tobirama supposed to guess that Gorou’s meandering conversation, which had eventually landed on the Hyuuga clan’s preference for brides who were demure and obedient and quiet and not frivolous, was referring to _him_?! 

It’s _entirely_ not his fault that Gorou had apparently interpreted his tendency not to look people in the eye as shyness, which it most certainly wasn’t, and his practice of whispering suggestions (and reprimands) to Hashirama as meekness, which it definitely wasn’t, and…okay, Tobirama is in fact fairly quiet and not frivolous, but the rest of it was clearly beyond ridiculous. But apparently Gorou then compounded his mistake by misinterpreting Tobriama’s occasional sidelong glances up at Gorou’s forehead as flirtation, of all things.

And anyway, even if he _had_ been flirting, which he wasn’t, there was certainly no call for Gorou to try to grab him in for a kiss!

Tobirama had a kunai at the man’s throat before he could blink – he’s a shinobi! you don’t suddenly grab shinobi! everyone knows that! – but Gorou just laughed and said something about a bit of feistiness being good in the preliminary stages and next thing Tobirama knew he was shoving the man back onto the floor so he wouldn’t get _roasted_ by Madara’s signature katon attack.

“Madara!” Tobirama hissed, turning to glare. “Stop attacking! He’s a _guest_.”

Madara’s eyes are hazy with drink but his face is very clearly filled with inexplicable rage, and he opens his mouth to say something when Hashirama cuts in between them with a laugh and a “Oh, well now, it’s clearly time to go to sleep, don’t you think? Tobirama, help me take Madara back home before he causes any more trouble – my apologies for interrupting your evening, Gorou-san –”

Gorou spluttered a bit in response, but Tobirama, pleased by the excuse to exit the party, had quickly agreed. 

If Tobirama had known what was in store for him, maybe he wouldn’t have so readily agreed.

“I wasn’t flirting!” he protests again, tugging at the restraints that had sprung up around him the second he'd walked through the door of their bedroom. Mokuton, of course, pulling him down onto his knees until he’s looking up at the two of them. "I didn't even notice he was interested!"

Hashirama shakes his head sadly, like Tobirama isn't perfectly able to detect his gleefulness underneath. "You shouldn't lead people on like that, Tobirama. It's not nice to them, and look at how upset you've made Madara."

Madara does, in fact, seem to be rather upset: he's pacing the room, muttering angrily to himself as his chakra lashes about the room and glaring occasionally at Tobirama.

He's also very clearly as drunk as a skunk.

"How much did you make him drink?" Tobirama asks Hashirama, though he keeps his eyes focused on Madara - somehow doing that seems to reduce the number of glares and reduce the incoherent mumbling. 

"I didn't _make_ him do anything," Hashirama sniffs. "He agreed to that drinking contest all on his own...he won, by the way."

"Good," Tobirama says, because it is. They want to be friendly, not show weakness, and that extends to the little things like drinking contests. 

"'course I won," Madara interrupts at that point, his voice slurring. "Stupid Hyuuga, thinkin' their dojutsu's better - think they can take our place - take what's _ours_ -"

"Horrible," Hashirama agrees solemnly. "What terrible people they are."

"Anija, stop encouraging him."

Hashirama predictably ignores him. "Still, the blame's not just on their side," he tells Madara. "I'm going to have to punish Tobirama for flirting like that."

Tobirama sighs, while Madara nods seriously as if he actually thinks Tobirama did something wrong.

Given that Madara normally objects to Hashirama’s punishments, at least in the beginning, it’s pretty clear that he is, indeed, incredibly drunk right now.

"Of course," Hashirama says thoughtfully, and that's when Tobirama gets nervous. "If you like, you could punish him instead..?"

"Me?" Madara asks, looking comically taken aback by the suggestion.

"Of course you. Don't you want to show him he's yours, and not that _awful_ Hyuuga's?"

If Tobirama didn’t know it would only make things worse, he’d be glaring at Hashirama right now. He really shouldn't be encouraging Madara like this. If these negotiations work out, they're going to have to _live_ with these people!

"Mine," Madara says. The slurring's only gotten worse. "Yes, I can - show 'im..."

"Punish him," Hashirama prompts. He looks so very smug; if it wasn’t for how genuinely fond of them both he so clearly is, it would be intolerable. 

Madara nods.

"Are you sure about this?" Tobirama asks warily. Madara's never taken an active role in punishing him before; it usually makes him uncomfortable to start with before he gets drawn in to Hashirama’s games, yielding to the inescapable force of Hashirama’s will. Taking the lead like this is – different. "Madara -"

"Shut up. You're _mine_. Mine. And - and I'm gonna _teach_ you."

...great. 

It’s not that Tobirama objects, necessarily, to Madara being the one to punish him – he suspects Madara will be more merciful than Hashirama usually is, since Madara has yet to develop Hashirama’s immunity to his pouts –but he’s a little worried about how the alcohol will affect this encounter, given how pissy and jealous Madara clearly is right now.

Of course, on the other hand, it is rather nice to hear Madara call him his.

“Hashirama, Hashirama,” Madara says, almost whining. “I need you to get me. Something. A thing. I need it.”

“Oh?” Hashirama inquires, looking amused. “Whisper in my ear.”

Tobirama strains his ears, but can’t hear what Madara says, but whatever it is does make Hashirama laugh.

“Oh, yes,” he says, grinning. “I can get you that. Why don’t you get Tobirama ready first?”

Madara nods, overly serious again in a way that suggests he’s using all of his remaining brain cells to focus on not falling over. 

And then Hashirama actually leaves the room, of all ridiculous things, and Madara walks (remarkably steadily) over to Tobirama.

Tobirama opens his mouth to try to inject at least some semblance of reason into the situation, but he’s interrupted with Madara pulls him in for a kiss. It’s soppy and wet, and Tobirama can taste the sake on Madara’s tongue, the other man’s bubbling hot chakra making his skin buzz pleasantly.

Tobirama has no problems with this form of punishment.

Madara starts kissing all over his face, cheeks and neck and jaw, mumbling really quite delightful things like “never giving you up” and “all mine” and “not going _anywhere_ ” as he does. 

“I wasn’t planning on going anywhere, you idiot,” Tobirama groans, but he lolls his head back so that Madara can get better access to that one spot on his neck he likes. “Even if I did leave – which I wouldn’t – you and Hashirama would immediately come get me _back_.”

“Damn right we would,” Madara agrees, working off Tobirama’s clothing. It’s taking a while, given that he can’t quite manage buttons with any coherence, but since that in turn means lots of touching and groping and more kisses, Tobirama doesn’t object. “S’why you gotta be shown that you can’t go – go – _flirting_ with people. S’pecially not Hyuuga.”

That damn rivalry. Konoha is going to _explode_ once the Uchiha and Hyuuga are forced to actually live together. 

The parent-teacher nights at the academy are going to be particularly gruesome, he just knows it. 

“Will it make you feel better if you punish me?” Tobirama asks, feeling deeply fond of Madara right now. 

Madara nods, and pulls Tobirama – now naked but for his collar and the flexible bindings Hashirama left behind – over his lap.

Tobirama suspects he’s about to be spanked, and squirms a little to make sure he’s in a proper position to get stimulation to his cock when the strikes come down. It’s the sort of thing Hashirama would remember to make sure he can’t do, but Madara’s drunk and Tobirama’s opportunistic. 

He’s also a little curious, to be perfectly honest. He’s watched Hashirama do it to Madara a few times, but Hashirama’s punishments to him haven’t involved spanking yet. 

(Though that hasn’t actually saved his ass any. If he didn’t know better, he’d think his brother was secretly getting revenge for being made to do paperwork by making sure that Tobirama can’t sit comfortably while doing his own.)

“Aww, Tobirama, you look so cute like that,” Hashirama coos from where he’s clearly just entered the room. He’s in Tobirama’s blind spot, which is irritating because it makes Tobirama tense up automatically even though it’s his _brother_ ; he shouldn’t be nervous around his brother, no matter what. He forces his body to relax.

Naturally, that’s when the first slap comes, making him yelp in surprise. 

Hashirama bursts out laughing.

“Great,” Tobirama sighs. “You’re drunk too.”

It’s much harder to tell with Hashirama, since he’s only ever drunk when he chooses to be. Not that many people know it, but Hashirama’s body metabolizes anything – including poisons, as some very unfortunate people have learned – and alcohol is little different. It takes an effort of will for him to remain tipsy, though to Tobirama’s annoyance it is an effort Hashirama engages in on routine basis.

“Of course,” Hashirama says cheerfully. “You don’t think I’d let them get into that drinking contest without some moral support, do you?”

“You don’t need _moral support_ for drinking – ” 

He manages not to yelp this time when Madara spanks him, mostly because he's a shinobi who is _perfectly capable_ of taking a few hits, even while his brother is being distracting. 

If he hadn’t been able to figure that trick out, he would’ve died on his first battlefield.

“Look, Hashi’ama,” Madara rumbles above him. “He’s gone all _red_.”

He runs a hand lightly over Tobirama’s skin. It feels nice. 

“S’pretty…”

“You should do it some more,” Hashirama, who’s never seen a situation he couldn’t make worse, suggests. “Make him _really_ red.”

Tobirama braces himself, but it proves largely unnecessary. Madara’s drunkness is luckily not of the variety that involves subconscious mastery and his strikes, while powerful, are haphazard and fairly predictable, and he doesn’t mind Tobirama rubbing off against his lap with each hit.

(Madara’s chakra is so warm around him, spiking at every hit, pleasure and smug satisfaction radiating outwards, that Tobirama’s cock is glad for the stimulation.)

It’s…not bad, actually. Perhaps it helps that Tobirama was never disciplined like this as a child – his father used other methods to obtain compliance, and his mother never found fault in him – so it’s not as humiliating as it could be.

“Look at you, humping his leg like an over-eager puppy,” Hashirama laughs. “Maybe I should get you a pair of ears and a tail, too.”

Right.

_There’s_ the humiliation.

Tobirama feels his face go red and he tries to stop himself from moving – from grinding down further on Madara’s lap as the man laughs along with Hashirama, putting his warm palm on the stinging part of Tobirama’s thighs and ass – but just as he finally gets a measure of self-control, Madara reaches down and shoves his legs open.

Familiar hands settle on Tobirama’s ankles, keeping him from closing his legs, and Tobirama immediately stops moving obediently. He wishes his brother would get out of his blind spot, or at least start talking more, no matter how embarrassing: he hates displeasing Hashirama more than death, and tracking the ebbs and flows of his chakra tells him only so much without the added benefit of seeing his body language. 

A second later Tobirama stops thinking about it, because Madara’s just pushed something into him, something that is most definitely neither his fingers nor his cock, but which also doesn’t feel like one of Hashirama’s Mokuton roots. If anything it…

Smells of ginger?

Tobirama’s main specialty might be creating new jutsus and seals, but everyone always seems to think that that involves waving his hands around until something new happens rather than all the science it actually involves. To do what he does, he needs a solid foundation in physics, biology (especially shinobi-specific), mathematics, earth sciences, and, of course, _chemistry_.

So he figures out what’s about to happen about half a second before the oils of the peeled ginger start causing a distinct tingling, and then burning, sensation. 

“Madara!” he exclaims, then yelps as Madara starts spanking him again.

This time Tobirama starts writhing in earnest, torn between his own instincts: if he tenses up in preparation for the strikes, the burning from the ginger spikes up considerably, but if he forcefully relaxes, the slap hurts much more than when he was ready for it.

Also, Madara’s laughing at him.

Probably because his fingers are clenched on Madara’s thighs and he’s desperately grinding himself into Madara’s lap, his cock hard and dripping. He feels his face flush with humiliation – he’s heard of this, it’s a punishment for disobedient children, isn’t it, and of course a katon clan would focus on the feeling of fire for punishment – but it’s not even that, not really, and it’s not the pain, which is really quite minimal compared to broken bones or other tortures.

It’s –

He doesn’t know how to describe it.

It’s the way Madara keeps saying he’s beautiful in that soft drunken slur, telling Hashirama to look at him, the warm feeling of approval in his too-hot chakra and how it’s reflected in his brother’s too-bright-too-green one; it’s the way Tobirama could escape if he wanted to, he’s a shinobi, but he won’t because he doesn’t want to, even when it’s uncomfortable and painful, because this is important to him, letting Madara do with him as he liked is important to him – not as important as deferring to Hashirama is, no, nothing can be, but it’s almost the same feeling.

Submission. _Belonging_.

“He’s so good for you, Madara,” Hashirama says fondly, and Tobirama can imagine the expression of approval on his face. “Look at how beautifully he suffers; how can you not want to punish him? How can you not want to _keep_ him?”

Tobirama whines.

Madara puts his free hand on Tobirama’s neck, warm and bracing even through the collar. “Have you learned your lesson?” he asks, even as he keeps alternating spanks and long, tender strokes that vaguely remind Tobirama of how Madara likes to pet stray dogs or his hawks or whatever. “Are you going to stay mine now?”

“Yours,” Tobirama agrees. “Yours, yes, _yours_ – can I come now?”

Hashirama laughs again. “And I’m not even restraining him,” he says, sounding pleased. Even pleasantly surprised, which is wonderful; Tobirama loves nothing more than to surprise his brother with something that makes him happy. “Oh, _very_ good, Tobirama; I approve. It’s only right that you should ask for permission first. What a good boy you are.”

Tobirama nods, feeling a little drunk himself – the adrenaline high of trusting someone as dangerous as Madara with his body, the feeling of burning that reminds him a bit of the man himself, the endorphins of the blows…and, yes, the wonderful way it feels to know that he’s theirs and they’re his, that even if Izuna has his own special somebody that Tobirama does too, that he got to spend the festival with them anyway even if it wasn’t quite what he’d imagined.

(Yes, he’s a spiteful and overly competitive soul, but at least he knows it.)

“Yes,” Madara says, voice low and hot. “Yes, Tobirama, come for me. _Now_.”

And he puts a hand down under Tobirama, wrapping it around his cock to give it a few strokes, and that’s all the stimulation Tobirama needs, embarrassingly little, before he comes.

It’s only afterwards, when he feels all hazy and floaty, does he realize what a mess he’s made of Madara’s formal pants.

“Shh, shh, it’s all right,” Hashirama says, petting Tobirama’s head, which has somehow ended up in Hashirama’s lap. “Don’t worry about it. He always gets like this, you know – he was made responsible for laundry as a child, what with his suiton skills, and the last thing you want is for him to try to pull liquid out of your clothing while he’s not concentrating; he has a tendency to miss.”

Tobirama thinks that last part was aimed at Madara rather than him. It makes sense from context, but it takes him a few seconds of puzzling to figure out who Hashirama is talking about, and that probably means he shouldn’t be doing suiton. 

Even though he hasn’t missed in _ages_ , and anyway it’s not as if Hashirama wasn’t fine afterwards. The only thing seriously injured was his vanity. 

(It’d been kind of funny, actually, what the sudden infusion and removal of water does to hair.)

Still, there’s no point in arguing the point now – he’s been so tired and stressed about this negotiation, given how wealthy and influential the Hyuuga are and how including them increases the likelihood of their village being formally recognized by the daimyo significantly, and now he’s relaxed and Madara is warm and cuddling up against him, so clearly the right thing to do is just go to sleep and worry about laundry and clean-up later.

He returns to consciousness slowly when he hears birds, which suggests that it’s very early morning, and Madara is speaking quietly over his head.

“– it’s not that I _disagree_ with your methods, entirely,” he’s saying. “I mean, the fact that you're brothers is still...nevermind. It's just – I don’t know. I shouldn’t have done that.”

“Why not? He liked it.” That’s Hashirama, using the practical and reasonable tone of voice he uses when he’s steamrolling someone into something without letting on that’s what he’s doing. “You’re my best friend, Madara. I like sharing him with you. And that means he’s yours, too.”

Madara’s chakra shivers with pleasure.

“Yours to keep,” Hashirama purrs. “Yours to punish, yours to reward…I don’t know why you object so much.”

“Relationships aren’t about _punishment_ ,” Madara says, but it’s weak. He’s already half convinced, Tobirama can hear it. “Normal ones, that is.”

Hashirama snorts. “How would you know? Seen many of those?”

Madara somehow makes the ensuing silence sound somehow sulky.

“Don’t worry so much about what’s normal,” Hashirama says. “It feels good, doesn’t it? Just enjoy it. I’ll take care of the rest. I’ll always take care of you both, you know that.”

“I worry when you say things like _that_ ,” Madara grumbles, but he settles back down along Tobirama. A moment or two later, he asks, “Do you think he…? I know I was drunk, and I’m terrible at saying – but sometimes I think he thinks he’s – second best.”

“Something keeps making him think that,” Hashirama says, and there’s a strange edge of steel in his voice. “I don’t know what, or who, but I won’t abide it. I’ll tear the ill-will out from our village by the root if I have to.”

“I’ll be right beside you,” Madara promises, his voice equally hard. “I’ve heard it, too, but I can’t trace it, can’t track it…”

Tobirama thinks they’re talking about him, though he is second-best, he has to be, when the village he works so hard for so clearly _hates_ him. He knows the two of them love him, of course – or at least that Hashirama does, and that Madara is fond of him too, as he can see from the way the man fights for him when there’s no need for it, but Tobirama would never allow the village to stain their reputations with whatever toxicity he carries within himself.

Though – the way they speak of ill-will, it’s as if they think it’s something alive, something malevolent. 

He doesn’t know what they mean by that; there’s nothing like that, surely.

Oh, he supposes that Hashirama has been getting techy again about the village disliking him the way his clan always has – all those rumors in the village about him, about how cold and heartless and terrible he is – and, yes, to be sure, the rumors are worse than ever before, and it seems like nothing he can do will raise his standing a single jot, but that can’t be what they’re talking about. 

After all, what benefit would anyone get from trying to isolate him like that? 

(If he didn’t know better, he would almost suspect Hashirama of providing his village with a convenient scapegoat to get out their anger on, but that’s obviously impossible. Hashirama would never willingly let anyone speak ill of something that belonged to him.)

“Be patient,” Hashirama says. People don’t think he’s good at patience, because he’s so boisterous, but Hashirama can keep pieces in reserve for years before playing them. He’s got the patience of the trees, and they think in terms of decades, even centuries. “Give it time.”

“But…”

“Give it time.” A spike of amusement in Hashirama’s chakra. “In the meantime, we can keep punishing him until he’s certain of our affection.”

Tobirama mentally rolls his eyes. He knows what Hashirama’s doing, even if Madara doesn’t – tying Madara to them both with guilt and love and responsibility, making him feel the obligation of staying not just because he’s needed but because he’s jealous of the power he’s been given, Hashirama skillfully turning pleasure and punishment both into chains that Madara will never break no matter how or if he tries to run. 

Madara still thinks there might be away out, after all. He hasn’t yet figured out that there isn’t.

No way out…

Tobirama suddenly sits straight up, shaking both Madara and Hashirama off of him. “The negotiations!” he blurts out. “The Hyuuga joining the village! I’m going to be _late_!”

“Tobirama –” Hashirama starts, then yelps when Tobirama grabs him by the ear and shakes him, even though he knows Hashirama will find a way to take it out of him later. Paperwork and administration have always been Tobirama’s domain, unquestionably, and even if it’s only because Hashirama doesn’t care for them, he has never challenged Tobirama’s mastery there.

“Get dressed this instant! You’re the _Hokage_ , you can’t be seen as lazing around! The Hyuuga value punctuality as an important measure of respect; we will be mortally offending them if we are not prepared in time! Madara –”

“I’m going, I’m going!” Madara shouts, holding his hands out in front of him. “I’ll be bathed and dressed in minutes, just don’t hit me with a water dragon again!”

It was _one time_. Also, that water gout was barely the size of a small goat; Tobirama has hit Madara with far worse in their occasional sparring sessions.

Besides, there’s no way he’s trusting Uchiha what’s-the-point-in-a-bath-that-takes-less-than-an-hour Madara with getting himself ready in time.

Tobirama readies the jutsu.

Madara tries to run.

(It’s as futile as any attempt to run from a Senju is, and Tobirama’s sure if he tried he could think of some metaphor for how Madara was slowed down by tripping over their tangled bedsheets.)

With some (significant) effort, Tobirama manages to get them put together and presentable in time for the first meeting of the day.

And if the means he uses to do so cause rumors to start up again later that day, rumors about him being tyrannical and overbearing, filled with arrogance and harshness and nothing but spite, almost reptilian in his condescending disdain, accompanied by reports that his brother and his lover had been seen together whispering that something had to be done about his cruelty –

Whatever.

If that’s the price Tobirama has to pay for his brother’s happiness, for the village Hashirama and Madara dreamed of together, then he’ll pay it gladly.


	8. Training Week 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For @writhingbeneathyou on tumblr

Something will probably have to be done about Izuna.

Hashirama smiles vacantly at his best friend’s younger brother as he continues to rant. Despite their proximity, Izuna never really became his precious person - but he is Madara's, and thus Hashirama considers Izuna to be his by proxy and thus important - no matter how annoying he might be sometimes.

Izuna had stormed into Hashirama’s office at full Uchiha boil, which would be funny except for how it’s keeping Hashirama there when all he wants is to go back to rejoin Tobirama and Madara already.

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” Hashirama interjects when Izuna stops for air, keeping his tone polite. Far more polite than Izuna deserves, really, what with his implications and innuendos suggesting that Hashirama has taken his beloved brother off to be murdered or tortured or for some other nefarious purpose. And, sure, there might have been _some_ kidnapping involved, but Hashirama’s intentions are hardly nefarious! Madara’s getting everything he’s ever wanted, and everything Hashirama’s ever wanted, too. What’s the problem? “As I’ve already told you, we went out on a secret high ranked – sorry, S-ranked – mission. I got the summons telling me to come back and I did, even now a second time –”

And oh, Hashirama loves his village, but someone is _definitely_ going to die for that.

“– but I’ll be going back out to join them soon enough. Your brother is not at any serious risk.”

Izuna crosses his arms in front of him. “And I’ll be going with you.”

Hashirama manages not to snort aloud at the thought of Izuna walking in on some of the scenes between Madara and Tobirama that he’s been recording for himself in the little hideaway he put them both in. He doesn’t think Izuna will properly appreciate what Hashirama is doing.

Pity, that, because Hashirama’s plan is working _so well_.

If he can just pull this off, Hashirama will get to keep his most precious people close to him, Madara will get a haven from all his worries, and Tobirama will finally, _finally_ get to have someone (other than Hashirama) who loves and adores him the way he deserves, with all the intensity of true Uchiha obsession.

All Hashirama wants is for his beloved ones to be happy, and he truly, sincerely believes that their happiness can only be achieved when they’re with him. So, really, when you think about it like that, it’s practically incumbent upon him to do whatever it takes, _anything_ it takes, to seize that wonderful happiness for all of them. And no matter how difficult, that is a duty he is more than willing to take on.

(For Madara, Hashirama would and has crushed his own clan into meek compliance, all to enable them to obtain their mutual dreamed-of village of peace.

For Tobirama, Hashirama would raze down _forests_ , and for him that’s saying something.

There is _nothing_ he will not do for them – nothing, that is, but let them go free…)

“There’s no need for you to come along, Izuna,” Hashirama says sweetly. “We’re perfectly safe, or as safe as you can get on a mission.” His smile broadens, beatific and radiating inner peace in a way he knows is extremely irritating, especially to people who – like Izuna – think he really is that dumb. “After all, we already have the three strongest shinobi in the village on the job.”

Izuna doesn’t quite manage to hide the way the reminder makes him scowl. Tobirama’s superior status rankles and eats away at Izuna, Hashirama knows, but after how gloriously Tobirama defeated him – Tobirama’s brilliant mind defeating the Sharingan at last, even the great Mangekyo Sharingan itself – there can be no question anymore.

Tobirama is the third strongest – Izuna only the fourth.

After all, Tobirama had all but killed his rival, while it was only through Hashirama’s mercy that Izuna yet walks the earth.

Mercy, yes – and patience. 

Oh, Hashirama has learned all about patience, this past decade or so. He was an impatient child, he acknowledges as much: he should never have asked Madara to choose him over his family by the riverbank – they were young, weak; they could never have stood together against their parents for their peace, not when their brothers would have paid the price for it. They should have laid in wait, grown strong, and _then_ they could have acted, acted _together_ , and things would have been different, better.

He didn’t wait, and now he has to work twice as hard to fix what he broke – but fix it he will.

Madara wants to choose family over Hashirama?

Fine.

(It’s not fine.)

Hashirama will weave himself and his Tobirama into Madara’s conception of family so permanently that they can never be plucked out: he’ll plant the seeds now and let them grow until Madara’s heart and soul are ripe for the harvest.

He knows what he wants and he knows how to get there - and he knows that he will use all of his resources to get it.

Even the resources that don’t yet know they are his.

Like - say - poor, ignorant little Izuna.

After all, what Izuna doesn’t know won’t hurt him -

\- until Hashirama decides that it will.

“Listen to me, Senju,” Izuna says heatedly, putting his hands down on Hashirama’s desk. It’s almost offensive how free he feels with Hashirama’s personal space, but then, he thinks of Hashirama as a soft-hearted fool, a perception Hashirama has done exactly nothing to dissuade him of. It’s far too amusing. “I’m going to get straight to the point –”

“Oh, good,” Hashirama says innocently. “I’d been wondering when you were planning to do that.”

“You –! I know you're up to something. My brother _never_ leaves home without warning or telling me –”

“My fault entirely,” Hashirama cuts in smoothly. “I’m afraid I sprang the mission on him last second – forgot all about it until it was time to head out. You know me: I’d misplace my head if it wasn’t attached!”

He laughs, even as Izuna seethes. Mostly _because_ it makes Izuna seethe; if Izuna wasn’t so set in his belief that Hashirama is a blithering idiot, he might actually realize that Hashirama’s been mocking him this entire time.

“How long is this mission supposed to last again?” Izuna finally demands, as if Hashirama hasn’t already told him five times.

“We should be back a week after we first set out.” 

“If he’s a _single_ day late –”

“Isn’t the usual worry date four days out?” Hashirama wonders. “Or at least two, for short range ones? Do you not trust Madara to be able to complete a mission, is that it? You should have more respect for your elders.”

Izuna makes a frustrated sound like kettle boiling. “Listen, he’d _better_ be back on time, you hear me?”

“I hear you. I’m not sure I _understand_ you, but I certainly hear you.”

Izuna scoffs. “Just make absolutely sure he’s back in one piece, or else -”

“I’ll always do my best to take care of Madara,” Hashirama assures him. “He’s very precious to me.”

“Yes, yes, your ‘precious people’; the whole world knows about your stupid Will of Fire and your precious people…!” Another scoff. “I’ve just about filled up on it. Tell me the instant my brother gets back.” 

Hashirama watches as Izuna storms out.

Shaking his head, he gets up to go: with Izuna gone, there’s nothing keeping him here, and he has high hopes for what Madara and Tobirama have gotten up to in his absence. Madara’s been positively mad for Tobirama ever since he left them alone that first time, worshipping every inch of him with classic Uchiha obsession; it’s all working out very well according to plan.

An Uchiha tracker does try, not-so-subtly, to follow him out of the gates, but Hashirama loses him easily, just as he does the one who follows far more subtly, seeking to use the shadow of the first as a dodge. Izuna’s loyalists, of course, but Hashirama is not respected throughout the many nations and nor revered among the many clans as the God of Shinobi because he would fall for such an insipid little play as that.

Yes, something will clearly have to be done about Izuna.

After losing his tails in the forest, Hashirama doubles back to the secure little outpost where he’s left his brother in Madara’s tender care.

Hashirama grins in earnest as he walks into the room: they’re on the bed, Tobirama lying flat on his back, eyes glazed over with pleasure and moaning as Madara thrusts into him, kneeling between his splayed legs.

Delightful.

Hashirama wonders if either of them really needed the infusion of aphrodisiac he included in the tea he served them that morning before he returned to the village, or if he would have walked in on them like this regardless, but dismisses the thought as irrelevant a second later; there’s really no harm in being certain, after all.

“Having fun without me, I see,” he remarks cheerfully, shedding his clothing as he comes forward to kneel by the bed. He’s been hard since he left the office, and after the aggravating day he had he thinks he deserves a nice treat. “Madara, push him forward a bit, will you?”

Madara obliges him, and Tobirama hangs his head back over the side of the bed, opening his pretty little mouth to take Hashirama’s cock without even the slightest bit of urging.

The position robs Tobirama of all autonomy: with one leg wrapped around Madara’s chest and the other draped over Madara’s arm, his back arching and his neck hanging low and supported only by Hashirama’s hand, he’s being held entirely aloft between them, shifting back and forth with their thrusts.

Entirely at their mercy.

Perfect.

“That’s wonderful, Tobirama,” Hashirama praises, even as he fucks his brother’s throat without much concern for the difficulties of the position. Tobirama’s a trained shinobi, lithe and flexible; he can handle it. “Very well done; you’re getting so good at this. Madara, isn’t he getting good at this?”

Madara scoffs a little. He would sound remarkably like his younger brother but for the fact that his version comes across as rather fond instead of condescending.

“Enjoying teaching your baby brother to suck your cock, Hashirama?” Madara asks, not slowing his thrusts in the slightest. “That turn you on?”

“It’s a hard job, but someone has to do it,” Hashirama says virtuously. It’s ridiculous enough to make Tobirama actually laugh around his cock, a delightful feeling, and it brings a smile to Madara’s face. “Might as well be you and me, wouldn’t you say?”

“Hashirama…”

“Besides, I’ve already taught him _that_. This is just a new position. Like a graduation lesson!”

Madara barks a laugh. “You’re _absurd_.”

Hashirama grins and reaches out to reel Madara in for a kiss, tasting Madara’s laughter on his tongue even as he enjoys the feeling of Tobirama’s hot little mouth, the way he moves his lips and tongue along Hashirama’s cock to try to make it better for him as he thrusts in, glorying in his brother’s submission.

This is how it should be, he thinks to himself: Madara happy, distracted from the worries and the weight his clan has placed on his shoulders; Tobirama safe between them, safe and loved and _appreciated_ the way he should always be, and would never believe just from Hashirama alone; and the three of them concerned with nothing but the great joy of being together, a joy that grows all the greater for being shared.

This is how it should always have been.

This is how it _will be_ , if Hashirama has anything to say about it. He’s going to make this beautiful present into his future, his _permanent_ future, and absolutely no one will stand in his way.

_Especially_ not Izuna.

Hashirama wonders idly if it’s time for Izuna to have another little relapse of that lung complaint of his, the one that stems from that little snarl of scar tissue left over in his chest from the battle wound he incurred from Tobirama’s sword. All perfectly natural, of course; the Uchiha medics themselves confirmed that it was truly amazing that Hashirama had managed to keep the scarring to such a minimum amount.

And if their iryo jutsu is not strong enough to see that within that scar tissue there is the tiniest little dab of foreign cells, mostly dead and entirely dormant unless awakened with the Mokuton, that once upon a time came from a species of tree called _ficus aurea_ –

Well. That’s just too bad, isn’t it?

Hashirama smirks a little at the thought – he takes the opportunity to slide his tongue into Madara’s mouth, to mercilessly grind into Tobirama’s face, enjoying the uncomplicated pleasure they were both giving him – but ultimately decides against it.

Annoying or not, scheming or not, _threat_ or not, Izuna will remain untouched for now.

After all, the true purpose of the so very aptly-named strangler fig is to ensure that Izuna will not waste his life in battle: Madara loves and fears for his last brother, the bastion of his sanity, and Hashirama knows that although Madara is saddened by Izuna’s mysterious condition, he is secretly pleased that it does not impact his life in any serious manner and cannot fully hide his lack of regret that Izuna has been forced to resign from the front lines, trading battle for administration in his new role as the head of T&I for the village.

No, best not to do anything: Madara would only worry if he found out that Izuna had another attack while he was gone, starting coughing and clutching at his chest as though something had curled around his lungs to press all the air out, and Hashirama wants this week to be one that Madara remembers with untainted joy.

Maybe another time, if Izuna continues to be so irritating.

“Oh, I missed you two,” Hashirama says, continuing to kiss Madara. He likes kissing Madara, and he’s got over a decade of kisses to make up for; he could spend all day doing just this. Having his cock sucked at the same time doesn’t hurt, though, especially since Tobirama has really become quite frighteningly skilled at it given the short amount of time he’s had to practice. “You know, I haven’t come at all this morning; isn’t that a terrible shame?”

“No, _you’re_ terrible,” Madara breathes against Hashirama’s lips, breaking away a little, but still fond, still laughing, and not pulling away the way he had been at first. No more struggling, no more attempts to escape: Madara’s forgotten all about that. It’s amazing how pleasure can break a person so much more thoroughly than torture, something professional torturers like Izuna never seem to realize – or else he’d be far more worried about his brother’s friendship with Hashirama than he already is. “Absolutely terrible, Hashirama. Did you put something in our tea this morning?”

“Who, me?” Hashirama asks, leaning forward to nip slightly at Madara’s neck – Madara likes a bit of pain with his pleasure, Hashirama’s found, and he’s already got all sorts of plans on how to best use that to maximum advantage. “I’m hurt at your, mmm, terrible insinuations. As if I’d ever do something so underhanded. Me, a sweet, good, innocent little shinobi…”

Madara laughs again.

“What makes you say that, anyway?”

“We haven’t been able to keep our hands off each other all day,” Madara says. “You did, then?”

“Obviously I did. There’s no such thing as an innocent shinobi. When did you notice?”

“Not until afternoon,” Madara concedes, which is hilarious: that meant they’d already been at each other all day without thinking anything was strange about it. “I’d decided to try riding Tobirama –”

“Oh, _did_ you now?” Hashirama asks, delighted. He’d had to guide or force them into trying all sorts of new positions and techniques, but he’s also had nearly five days of almost non-stop sexual play to distract them by now; they’d stopped even mentioning their other obligations at this point. And now they were starting to innovate on their own! “Did he like that?”

(He wonders if this satisfaction what it feels like when you finally break a feral animal's spirit to your yoke. He thinks it might be.)

Madara smirks, smug as a rooster strutting amongst the hens. “I’d tell you to ask him, but…”

“His mouth is otherwise occupied, yes. Good, good. How’d that give it up?”

“Well, he came pretty quickly –”

“Virgins,” Hashirama sighs, tutting a little down at a now-blushing Tobirama. He does so love humiliating his so-proud brother, a pleasure he reserves only for himself and no other, though perhaps if Madara is very good and very obedient Hashirama will consider letting him in on the fun. “Really, Tobirama, and here I thought you were doing so much better…”

“He did a perfectly respectable job of it,” Madara says, and oh, Hashirama loves how he’s defending Tobirama’s honor, even if there’s nothing really to defend.

Izuna’s going to be in for a nasty little surprise the next time he tries to cast aspersions on Hashirama’s little brother just because he’s a sore loser who can’t admit his own failure.

Hashirama really hopes he’s there to see it happen.

“And?” Hashirama prompts.

“Well, he got hard again right after,” Madara says wryly. “And given that he was still inside of me at the time, it was – noticeable.”

“I’m sure it was,” Hashirama says, laughing at the thought. He’ll have to watch that scene later; he can just imagine the looks on their faces. “Should I not have done it, then?”

Madara snorts. “Like me telling you to stop would have any effect –”

Good, he’s learning.

“– but as it happens, I’m more interested in getting my hands on some of that stuff, whatever it is. I can think of four different missions it would be _perfect_ for.”

“I’m not sure I’m pleased with you thinking about missions while fucking my brother,” Hashirama scolds his best friend lightly, though he doesn’t disagree. It is, in fact, extremely useful. “Don’t let us down, Madara; put your back into it or don’t bother.”

Madara’s always been marvelously competitive, and it doesn’t take much more than a few more goads before he’s really rutting away in earnest; Hashirama can lean back on his heels and let Madara’s thrusts move Tobirama’s mouth along his cock, no effort required.

It takes only a few more minutes for Madara to come after that, and then he curls up on the bedsheets and watches as Hashirama kneels back up to properly fuck Tobirama’s mouth.

Mindful of his visually-attenued audience, Hashirama makes sure to pull out and come on Tobirama’s face at the end.

“Lovely,” Madara says, his eyes heavy and lidded with post-orgasm languor. “Hashirama, you can handle clean-up, can’t you? Since this is all your fault, anyway.”

“Seems only right,” Tobirama agrees, his voice raspy, his throat well-used. “Go get some water, anija; we’re positively filthy.”

“Work, work, work,” Hashirama complains cheerfully, even as he does get up to get water and towels to help clean them both up. “That’s all you want me for, I knew it. I’m just superfluous free labor…”

“Shut up, anija. We’re sleeping now.”

“Damn right.”

Hashirama pretends to grumble, but he’s immensely pleased when he settles in between them, pulling both his brother and his best friend into his arms. He’ll deal with their insolence later, when he’s less content, less happy.

This is everything he wants in the world, right here. He’s going to keep it.

No matter who he has to sacrifice to do that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a short one - next chapter will be longer :)


	9. Early Years

Hashirama is a miracle.

Tobirama knows that to be true, because everyone says so. The first member of their clan in living memory to inherit that terrifying ancestral power, the Mokuton, the promise inherent within Senju blood fulfilled at long last - and just in time. Hashirama is a blessing sent from their ancestors, here to save them from the scourge of their enemies: the dreadful Uchiha, of course, among many other rival clans, but also, just as importantly, the ever-present threat of famine as the farms around them burn from the ever-present war and the darkened sky dooms their prayers that rice and wheat be abundant.

(The wind smells of ash, and people blame the fire-souled Uchiha for their losses. Children lost is one thing, but land is a Senju's soul, as sacred and untouchable as an Uchiha's eyes, and people go mad when nothing comes from the earth. Tobirama, as alone among his clan in his preference for water as he is in all other things, thinks of distant volcanos that erupt far more often beneath the sea than above the land, and looks to the cloudy sky with the thought that the land is not the only thing that plants need to grow.)

But those sorrows can no longer touch the Senju.

All of these evils are defeated, victory anticipated, and all because they have Hashirama now. Hashirama, who can fix it all for them, or at least let them look forward to a future filled with lush crops drenched in the blood of their enemies.

That's why they so revere him. Hashirama brings them hope where before they had none.

So it's okay, really, if he's sometimes a little – odd.

Who cares if sometimes he skips training in favor of wandering the forest, speaking to the trees as if he thinks they're speaking back?

Who cares if he laughs like a child, the wonderful seductive warmth of his smile never fading even when looking at a battlefield filled with death and despair?

Who cares if each spring drives him mad with unspoken rage, rendering him black-eyed and vicious, snarling and inarticulate and _dangerous_?

It doesn't matter.

Hashirama is their sign of victory ascendant, the one who will save them, and they love him without reservation.

Tobirama is no different from the rest of them in loving Hashirama.

Even if sometimes, he wonders -

But no.

He's read all the ancient scrolls his clan keeps safe, the ones describing their clan's extremely rare kekkai genkai, and they all hint that the Mokuton is a dangerous blessing to have: that those who wield it eventually become consumed by it, that they will find a way - _any_ way - to achieve their victory. Tobirama doesn't entirely understand why the scrolls all act as though it's a bad thing that great victory is always within the reach of the Mokuton, why they warn so many times that only the master of the Mokuton alone decides what constitutes such victory - why they repeatedly point out that the master of the forest will be a little too closely connected to their domain to be entirely understood even by their closest kin.

The morality of plants is not that of human beings.

So Hashirama being a bit odd makes sense, really, if you look at it that way. If he cites the Mokuton’s influence as the reason for his strange behaviors, it's only reasonable to believe him.

Besides, if Tobirama were to admit the truth, if only to himself, he would have to admit that he doesn't mind Hashirama's behavior as much as he probably should, for the sake of his clan.

Hashirama might be odd, yes, but in his oddness he loves Tobirama, and in that respect he's practically unique.

If Hashirama is his clan's miracle, Tobirama knows that he himself is its curse. What else could explain his clan's disdain? They turn away from him, ignoring him even though he is their leader's son. They play tricks on him, taking advantage of his serious nature and difficulty understanding nuance to mock him. They whisper about his eyes even when he's not looking at them - he never liked looking people in the eye, so it was easy enough to obey his father's order not to, but that just started more whispers about how easily it came to him, whispers offered up as just more evidence of how unnatural he is. They laugh at him when he moves his arms in the strange way that made him feel better, and with his father's permission made a game of dislocating his arms whenever they saw him do it - though at least Hashirama put a violent stop to that as soon as he figured out what they were doing.

Hashirama loves Tobirama when no one else does; surely, that must be something drawn from the Mokuton, too, and so Tobirama is very careful not to question any of his brother's strangeness.

(One of Tobirama’s great sorrows is that he can’t ever bring himself to wish that Hashirama did not love him: it is all he has, all he clings to, and for all that it hurts him in his soul when their father punishes him as a means to hurt the otherwise untouchable Hashirama, causing Hashirama to grind his teeth and bite his tongue to bleeding with rage, he can’t help but be secretly relieved by it, too, though he knows that if he was truly righteous he would have wished that Hashirama remained untouched by his brother's troubles. This is how Tobirama knows he must be a curse: his own father treats his very existence as little more than a goad used to control Hashirama, and Tobirama guiltily lets him do it because Hashirama’s love is the only thing he has that he can’t bear to lose. He’s a bad brother, Tobirama is, and he knows it, and if he spends the rest of his life trying to make up for the pain he has caused his brother just by suffering in front of him then it will still not be enough to assuage his guilt.)

Besides, it's not like Hashirama’s strangeness is all that bad, really.

It's not really _that_ bad to be ordered to share his brother's bed following that disaster on the river with the Uchiha and Hashirama's secret friend ( _you should have caught them earlier_ , his father bellows at Tobirama, and the rest of his clan agree; _what use is it being a sensor if you let such things happen_? he demands, and Tobirama doesn't know how to tell him that he knew all along but disregarded it because it made his brother happy so in the end he just doesn't say anything at all). The lack of privacy is a little irritating, yes, especially just as he was getting used to having his own space, but knowing that Hashirama loves him so much, fears losing him so much, that he wants him within arms' reach in the dark hours of the night has its own sort of joy.

It's not really that bad when Hashirama decides to take over the role of disciplining Tobirama, either. Oh, he doesn't _like_ being bound and forced to sit helpless at his brother's side, but it's better than the discipline he sees lurking in his father's glare, the way he still sometimes hurts Tobirama as a way to punish Hashirama, and anyway Hashirama's punishments are so much less severe as to be practically laughable. Besides, Hashirama only does it because he loves him so much and worries about him, he _says_ so, and it makes Tobirama so warm to know he is loved that he can almost forget the embarrassment of having his hands and legs tied together with rope, kneeling by his brother's side and being fed like a dog begging for scraps by the side of the dinner table.

It's not even really that bad in the spring, the terrible spring, where all of nature roars to life with a vengeance and Hashirama with it. The thick smell of pollen that fills the air of their compound is inescapable; where it makes some people sneeze and others look to their wives and husbands with anticipatory smiles, it drives Hashirama mad with the urge to possess and destroy and claim things for his own.

Really, Tobirama is _proud_ that Hashirama picks him to accompany him to his solitude each spring, even if he sometimes wishes he could have some warning before it happens rather than Hashirama simply appearing beside him and grabbing him, eyes wild and face twisted into a grimace, and carts him off over his shoulder as he heads into the forest in his yearly isolation meant to save his clan from himself.

Yes, maybe it's a little bit boring, sitting trapped inside that little well-warded shack, alone for days on end, unable to leave and with no food or water but what Hashirama lets him have from his hand, locked away with no access to anyone but his brother who spends most days out in the forest that grows in frightening new ways. But Tobirama can adapt to that, too; he's been teaching himself sealing and how new jutsus are made. It's a good skill to be able to entertain oneself, after all, a valuable thing to learn before he starts heading out regularly on solo missions – and if maybe he clings a bit more to Hashirama those nights than on others, pressing his body into his brother’s just to feel someone’s touch against his skin and greedily drinking up his brother’s words because it’s better than the dreadful silence...well, it’s just that there’s a difference between solitude and loneliness and sometimes those long days spent alone feel like the latter.

Besides, it's not like anyone in their clan would pick _him_ to spend their springtime festival with, anyway, so it's not like he's really missing anything.

Nobody would want _him_.

(It’s not that Tobirama doesn’t know that Hashirama chases away anyone who lingers too long, his brother's mind still full of the nightmares of Tobirama's unhappy childhood filled with pranks, but it’s fine, it’s really fine. Nobody wants him anyway, not really, and besides Tobirama doesn’t even really want a lover, not someone who just wants to use him and hurt him and count him as a victory to be won, the way Hashirama murmurs warnings about sometimes in the dark. He’s alone and he’s a curse and his brother’s love is the only thing he has and the one thing he cannot bear to lose, not for anything, and that means he appreciates his brother's protective love, he does, he really does, even if he does sometimes find himself longing for the touch of a friendly hand on his skin, however brief. But even there he can't really complain, because when he shyly told Hashirama about those strange longings – dreams of arms around him and kisses pressed against his lips – his brother only laughed and began to hug him more often, long lingering hugs that were only strange at first and quickly became like a soothing balm after a burn. Which just goes to show that Hashirama is right, of course; anything Tobirama wants, his loving brother can provide, and Tobirama shouldn't question that fact.)

So, really, it’s – fine.

If it got a little less fine and more embarrassing when Hashirama seemed to rather belatedly discover the joys his hands could bring him, well, whatever, Tobirama’s gotten very good at politely ignoring it, even if as time goes by he can’t help but sneak a few sidelong peeks out of curiosity. Hashirama likes to loll onto back when he touches himself, spread himself out without the blanket covering him, body relaxed and open and his cock hard in his hand as he strokes himself, and Tobirama just tries to keep very still and very quiet so Hashirama won’t be embarrassed to remember that he’s there.

(Hashirama’s not a virgin, not the way Tobirama is. On the elders’ advice, their father took Hashirama to a whorehouse for his first time, a seal painted on his back to prevent pregnancy, and took Tobirama along as well to guard his door from any shinobi that might try to take advantage of a vulnerable moment. It’d been spring, and Butsuma had presumably thought that Hashirama might get the rage out of his system through sex, but all that ended up happening was that the whores eventually gave up out of sheer exhaustion – yes, all of them – and Hashirama’d come back out, barely even winded, to grab a horribly blushing Tobirama and head to the outpost as usual. The elders hadn’t bothered to try it again next year.)

That much, at least, is normal, or at least so he thinks. His sensei hadn’t exactly been very clear about it all – it’s the father’s job to explain sex, really, but Tobirama’s father is far too busy for such things and so his sensei had stuttered his way through a short explanation of the mechanics of sexual interaction once he’d realized Tobirama was old enough to understand it. Regardless of the lack of clarity, he’d definitely explained that masturbation is normal and healthy, as long as it’s done in private.

And, well, Hashirama’s insistence that Tobirama share his bed means that they share a private space, so where _else_ would Hashirama do it? It makes perfect sense.

Hashirama’s always been less shy than Tobirama in that respect. In every respect, really.

“Tell me about the twins,” Hashirama asks one day, lounging in their room, his head on Tobirama’s lap the way he likes to when they’re alone. Tobirama’s practicing his iryo jutsu, his fingers glowing green by Hashirama’s temples, but no matter how much he tries he can’t seem to fix or even find the damage his diagnostic jutsu always insists is there.

“The twins?”

“Mm. Masako and Mariko. Have they settled on anyone yet? You know what I mean.”

“Oh. Uh, Masako’s chakra spikes whenever Nara Youta comes to visit, and he always visits the twins’ shop every time he does, so I think it might be mutual. That’s good, right? It’d be a good alliance.”

“Hmm. Only if we actually establish an alliance, though – the Nara are fairly firm in their neutrality at the moment. What would be the point if Masako just goes off to the Nara compound? Mariko would be heartbroken, assuming she doesn’t also marry a Nara.”

“No, she likes Itsuki.”

“Hm. No, that won’t do.”

“What’s wrong with Itsuki? He’s a Senju.”

“Yes, exactly; there’s no benefit in it. He’s stable, dependable, loyal...excellent alliance material. Wasted on Mariko.”

“But she likes him.”

“So? Easy enough to fix, once we figure out whether an argument or isolation would work better to kill the affection. Very easy to kill such things, as long as you catch them early enough. Hmm. Can you think of any other Nara that might work for her? We could keep one twin with us, send one to the Nara – that way we keep a Nara here, for security, and bind the one there to us as well. The twins will remain devoted to each other no matter what the distance.”

“I suppose so,” Tobirama says doubtfully. He doesn’t know anything about romance, though he supposes he does know something about being devoted to family. “You won’t ever send _me_ away, will you?”

“Of course not. You’re the heir; obviously you can’t leave home.”

Hashirama talked like that sometimes, as if their father was dead and gone and he was already clan head. It makes Tobirama worry, sometimes, but Hashirama made it very clear after that day on the riverbank that Tobirama had to choose between his father and his brother and stick to whatever choice he made, no going back, and of course Tobirama had picked Hashirama and that, he supposes, is that.

He’s pretty sure Hashirama’s only waiting until he comes of age to make certain the elders won’t be able to try to install some sort of interim head on a technicality.

(If that makes a frisson of fear run up Tobirama's back and turns his stomach, then it’s just because he’s being foolish: he picked Hashirama, has to stick with it, and if it makes him queasy to be silently complicit in his father’s premediated death, well, that’s just the price you pay for the choices you make.)

“What about after that, though?” Tobirama presses. He doesn’t let Hashirama get away with everything – okay, he lets him get away with _just about_ everything, but not clan business, administration and that sort of thing; Hashirama hates paperwork, so he leaves it in Tobirama’s hands – and this is important to him. “I don’t mind you marrying me off, if you have to, but I don’t want to go, even once you have – once you have another heir.”

To be perfectly honest, Tobirama’s a little terrified of that day, when it comes. Hashirama’s marriage to an Uzumaki is already a signed deal, though he’s yet to meet his bride – she, of course, will come to live with them, as is only right for the Senju's future clan head – and Tobirama is secretly convinced that either she or the nameless children she will bear for his brother will be the thing that finally steals his brother’s attention and love away from him, leaving him all alone in the world.

“‘Don’t mind’? ‘If I have to’?” Hashirama asks, tilting his head back to look up at him. “Don’t you want to get married, Tobirama?”

Tobirama shakes his head. “I don’t want to leave you, not ever,” he says honestly, and wonders a little at the flash of triumph in Hashirama’s eyes, as though that’s the response his brother had wanted to hear from him, even though Tobirama knows perfectly well that as the spare he’s meant to be used to form alliances.

Just another piece for his brother to play for the advantage of their clan.

“There are all sorts of advantages to being married, though,” Hashirama says, almost managing to be casual with it. “Someone nice to cuddle up with...don’t you want those?”

“They’re not important,” Tobirama says firmly. He can’t even really imagine being curled up in bed with some nameless figure, a woman he does not yet know and might not even have yet met: he’s been sleeping in Hashirama’s bed for so long that any time he thinks of the future he can’t really imagine anything different. “Anything I _really_ need, I can get from you, anija.”

That’s what Hashirama’s always telling him, after all.

Hashirama smiles, relaxing, and there’s something of the terrible spring lurking in the depths of that smile. “That’s right, Tobirama. Absolutely right. So don’t you worry, little brother; I won’t send you away, I promise. You’ll stay with me and I’ll take good care of you, just the way I always have.”

Tobirama smiles and nods, and thinks it’s settled.

And it is, he supposes, except that later that day, in the late lazy afternoon that they have all free to themselves for once, he wakes up from a pleasant doze to find Hashirama touching himself again and looking unusually thoughtful about it.

Tobirama closes his eyes again, intending to go back to sleep, except then Hashirama’s shaking his shoulder.

“What is it, anija?” he asks, keeping his eyes shut. He’s comfortable; whatever stupid idea his brother has – probably involving running errands for him, maybe for some more for the oil he likes to use on himself – can wait until he’s woken up all the way. Or, maybe, Hashirama could even go get the damn thing for himself for once.

“I’m worried, Tobirama.”

That gets Tobirama’s attention. “Worried?” he asks, opening his eyes and twisting to look at Hashirama. “About what?”

Hashirama looks at him with big soulful eyes. “I don’t want you to leave me, either,” he says. “But I’m worried that one day you will.”

“Well, that’s up to you, isn’t it?” Tobirama asks, puzzled. “You’re the clan head; you decide all the marriages.”

“Not _all_ of them,” Hashirama says. “Not the love matches.”

Tobirama snorts. For one thing, he had _just_ been helping Hashirama earlier that day to make sure the supposed ‘love matches’ tended in the right direction for the clan’s interests; for another, he highly doubted anyone would ever fall in love with _him_ , rendering the problem moot. Tobirama doesn’t love where he’s not loved, not unconditionally; how else could he agree to let his father die? “I don’t think that’s going to be an issue, anija.”

“No, no,” Hashirama says. “But still...do you touch yourself, Tobirama?”

Tobirama flushes bright red.

“You don’t, do you,” Hashirama concludes, sighing and shaking his head. “Tobirama, that’s not good; you _should_. It’s normal for boys your age.”

“I have,” Tobirama protests weakly. “I – once in a while – when I’m on mission, I guess…”

“Wet dreams don’t count.”

Tobirama winces. Most of his experiences do probably fall into that category: restless feverish sleep, dreams of sensations of all sorts, followed by waking up rubbing off into the bedroll or a pillow or (a few hideously embarrassing and never-mentioned times) his brother’s leg. And that’s just when he doesn’t wake up having already come while asleep.

He knows he should do it more often, yes, but Hashirama’s _always there_ , sharing a bed and a bath, and Tobirama just gets so flustered and embarrassed – and besides, he hates the idea of somehow doing it wrong, especially where Hashirama might see.

(He does sometimes mimic what Hashirama does, but with Hashirama around every corner and all the work he has to do, it’s easier to just – not. And then, of course, the dreams come…)

“You just don’t know how to do it properly,” Hashirama decides, because he knows Tobirama better than anyone else. “I’ll show you.”

Tobirama somehow hadn’t been expecting that. “Anija, don’t be ridiculous. We’re brothers.”

“So what? Doesn’t that just mean that it’s my job to show you things you need to know?”

Tobirama hesitates. Usually, yes, that’s the case, but…

“Isn’t sex – different?” he asks. He swears he’s read or seen something somewhere that said that siblings don’t want to know about each other’s sex lives – though he supposes those must be ones that don’t share a bed.

Hashirama shrugs. “Maybe for some people,” he says airily. “I certainly don’t mind – plants, you know, are all related anyway.”

Huh. That’s a good point. Still, surely...

“Besides, Tobirama, this is important! I won’t have you running off into some stupid ill-thought-out marriage just because you don’t know how to take care of your own sexual urges.”

Tobirama worries at his lower lip, distracted from his former thoughts by his horror at the concept. “Anija! I _wouldn’t_.”

“You might,” Hashirama says. “You’re a teenager, Tobirama, and I know you’ve been having those dreams nearly every night –”

That’s an exaggeration, surely? Tobirama usually only manages to furtively sneak away for some time to himself once every few weeks, but on the other hand he’s not always aware of the dreams...

“ – and eventually the frustration might get to you, and then where would I be? All alone, and you with someone else that doesn’t deserve you.”

Someone else who would abandon him at the first instance, no doubt, and Hashirama would never forgive him for such a betrayal, and then Tobirama would have _nothing_.

“Besides, you said yourself that I can provide you with everything you need,” Hashirama says, practical as always. “This is just more of that: a lesson on being independent.”

That’s how Hashirama had phrased teaching Tobirama to cook and clean, too, but Tobirama’s pretty sure that was only because Hashirama didn’t want to be bothered doing those chores himself.

Still, knowing how to cook and clean _is_ pretty useful. And Tobirama really doesn’t want to be married off, not to a stranger, and there’s always the chance that if he says no Hashirama will decide to arrange a marriage for him just because he’d decided that Tobirama needed to be taken care of sexually. That would be just awful, but it’d be just like Hashirama – always trying to take care of him.

If Tobirama could prove to Hashirama that he _didn’t_ need anyone taking care of him, that he could take care of it for himself...yes, that would be a good argument against any future marriage plans, wouldn’t it? If Hashirama worried about him not being happy, he’d be able to turn the tables on him, say that he’s doing just as he was taught and that he’s content that way.

And that way, he could stay by Hashirama’s side and continue to take care of him and be loved by him, forever.

“Okay,” he says. “But I really do think I know how to do – that. I mean, I’ve seen...pictures.”

Mostly he’s seen Hashirama, half-caught glimpses, but there definitely was one picture book that was being passed around the other boys his age that one time, where he saw a few pages before someone stole it away.

“Do you really? Show me.”

Tobirama turns red. Somehow he hadn’t thought about that part of – lessons. Hashirama would _see_.

(Hashirama might _tease_.)

“I promise to be nice,” Hashirama says.

“You’re _never_ nice,” Tobirama grumbles. He’s pouting and he knows it, but he’s not sure how else to react.

“I could be nice,” Hashirama says virtuously. “I mean, if I really wanted to?”

“To _me_?”

Hashirama cracks a grin. “You’re my brother! It’s my right and solemn duty to tease you till you blush.”

“It is _not_.”

It probably is.

“You’re stalling,” Hashirama observes. “Does that mean you’re scared?”

Tobirama can feel his ears turning red, because, well, he _is_ stalling, and good shinobi don’t put off things just because they’re scared (or embarrassed, which is more accurate). So he ducks his head down and pushes down his pants.

“Awww, you’re so _cute_ ,” Hashirama coos.

Now Tobirama’s whole face turns bright red. They bathe together on a regular basis; Hashirama is just being obnoxious. “Anija, do you want me to do this or not?”

“You’ll learn to like the teasing,” his brother says dismissively, with the air of someone who knows things for certain. “Now, show me what you do. Or would you like me to show you?”

If it’s a choice between being laughed at for doing it wrong or being thought overly cautious by asking for the demonstration, it’s an easy decision. “You show me.”

Hashirama’s eyes sparkle and he beams, and Tobirama is pleased by the signs that he’s made the right decision. “Okay. Come over here, then, and sit in my lap, facing away; I’ll do for you what I do for me.”

Tobirama obeys, settling between Hashirama’s legs.

Then he just barely manages to stifle a gasp, because the feeling of Hashirama’s hand on his cock is _nothing_ like his own.

Clearly he has, in fact, been doing this wrong.

And then Hashirama has to ruin it by _talking_. “Let me walk you through this,” he says brightly, using his teacher voice, and oh, Tobirama’s never going to be able to let his brother teach him anything ever again without thinking about this moment in the sun, warm and hot and filled with unexpected pleasure. “Now, generally I like to start with a nice long stroke –”

He demonstrates a few times.

Tobirama spills in under ten seconds.

“Tobirama, really,” Hashirama scolds, though he mostly sounds amused. He was probably expecting this. “How am I supposed to teach you if you can’t control yourself a little better?”

“Sorry, anija,” Tobirama says, mortified. “I didn’t mean to.”

“Well, it’s all right, I suppose. We’ll just have to keep going.”

“Keep going?” Tobirama asks, frowning. “But...”

“It’s okay,” Hashirama says, and there’s a smirk in his voice. “You’re young. I’m sure you can keep up.”

Tobirama cannot, in fact, keep up. The initial lesson takes thirty minutes, just going slowly through different types of strokes and speeds and interesting things you can do with your thumb or your fingers, and Tobirama has already come more times than he’s thought possible.

It’s _amazing_.

It’s also starting to get painful.

“Anija,” he whimpers. “Anija, _please_ , I _can’t_ , no more, please –”

“You’re getting hard again,” Hashirama observes gleefully. “I don’t think your body agrees with you.”

“Anija, it _hurts_.”

“Yes, but it feels good, too, doesn’t it?”

“Anija!”

“Oh, all right. One more time and we can move on to part two.”

Tobirama is about to start shouting – part two? _Part two_?! How many parts _are_ there?! – but then Hashirama does that thing with his hand that they’ve discovered will get Tobirama to come even if he’s trying not to (Hashirama tried it a few times just to check) and he’s biting his hand to try to keep from screaming as his vision goes temporarily white and his body shudders into yet another orgasm.

“A break,” he begs once he comes down. “Just a break, anija, please!”

“Never thought you’d be begging to get out of training,” Hashirama laughs. “But that’s all right; you can have a break. Time for a test.”

Tobirama blinks owlishly at him.

“I want to see if you’ve learned what I’ve taught you,” Hashirama clarifies.

“But you said I could have a break!”

Hashirama snorts. “Oh, yes, well, _fine_. You can show me on me, then.”

It’s not as if Tobirama wasn’t aware that Hashirama was hard behind him, and had been since the minute he’d sat there – probably before, since Hashirama’s own masturbation session had been interrupted for this lesson – but it hadn’t occurred to him that he’d be asked to touch him.

“If you’d prefer not to, we could always test it on you –”

“No, no, you’ll do just fine!” Tobirama says quickly, his voice nearly squeaking in a manner very unlike himself. He doesn’t want to touch himself for as long as Hashirama will let him – not everyone has super-quick healing the way Hashirama does, which sometimes he thinks his brother forgets. He’s so _sore_. “I’ll practice on you!”

Hashirama leans back as Tobirama scrambles to turn himself around. “If you do well, I’ll heal you up after,” he offers.

Tobirama nods – it’s good to have a reward to work towards, a fundamental precept of education – and sets about replicating what he’s learned.

Irritatingly enough, it turns out that Hashirama likes an entirely different set of moves than the ones Tobirama had liked best, and while Hashirama assures him that just demonstrating that he knows how to do something is sufficient, Tobirama’s competitive streak is now up and running. Maybe he won’t be able to get Hashirama to come _quite_ as many times as he did, but he can’t really call himself accomplished if he can’t get Hashirama to come at least a _few_ times.

He explains as much to Hashirama, who nods solemnly. “I understand your motives, and I promise you’ll be able to do it again another time, but right now you only get a few rounds before we’re moving on to part two, you understand?”

Tobirama sighs. There’s no stopping Hashirama when he’s got something fixed in his head – see: peace with the Uchiha – so he might as well just give in now.

Besides, this is kind of fun. He tries to keep the fact that it makes him hard hidden, leaning further forward and ducking his head down, but he’s pretty sure Hashirama can still tell.

“Okay, anija. I’ll do whatever you say,” he says, and then yelps when Hashirama unexpectedly jerks in his hands, and, oh, no wonder Hashirama had him sit facing away from him – given the way Tobirama had been kneeling and leaning over Hashirama, it’s gotten all over Tobirama’s hands and shirt. A little even got on his chin, which is pretty impressive.

“Take off your shirt,” Hashirama suggests. He’s panting a little. “That way you won’t get it any more dirty.”

Tobirama obeys, and goes back to work. He thinks about asking for a different position, but he can’t imagine his big brother sitting in _his_ lap – and anyway, it wouldn’t work, given that Hashirama is taller. He wouldn’t be able to see what he was doing.

Anyway, Hashirama promises to warn him next time, which he does, even though he does end up splattering all over Tobirama’s chest anyway.

“That’s good,” he says, looking very pleased. “Well done, Tobirama.”

Tobirama flushes again, this time with pleasure. He loves making his brother happy.

(Hearing it makes his cock twitch, a little, but that’s only reasonable, given what they’re doing.)

“Now, part two.”

It would disappoint Hashirama if Tobirama tried to refuse, so he doesn’t, crawling back into Hashirama’s arms and sighing with relief when the glowing green light makes the soreness disappear as if it’s never been.

It appears that part two is a more elaborate version of part one, involving other body parts.

Hashirama spends what must be a near quarter-hour just on his chest and nipples alone, showing him how they can be stroked gently or pinched harshly, until Tobirama is thrashing and begging for a touch to his cock, too, because it’s feeling very left out right now.

“You do it,” Hashirama says mercilessly, and Tobirama does, though he does think grumpily to himself that it’s not _quite_ as good as when Hashirama does it.

It also turns out that he likes having nails lightly raked down his inner thighs, though it doesn’t do as much for him when he does it himself, and Hashirama amuses himself for a good long while sucking bruises into Tobirama’s neck and collarbone even though Tobirama protests that he wouldn’t be able to do it to himself.

“That’s what clones are for,” Hashirama says, and Tobirama does _not_ want to think about that. He’s already overwhelmed: the thought of _even more_ – no way.

Hashirama’s also just as demanding in round two as he was in round one, and Tobirama’s left begging for mercy even as he obediently keeps tugging at his cock because he’s come too much already: even naked, he’s positively filthy, his own come dripping on his belly and chest and thighs.

“Just a little more,” Hashirama says coaxingly, and Tobirama entirely loses track of time after that – he remembers that Hashirama spent a lot of time putting fingers inside of him and letting him pleasure himself on them, moving up and down in a way that worked really well and felt great, and then made him do the same thing for himself (not as good as Hashirama, which is starting to become a trend), and that there were other things he couldn’t even remember because it was just so, so much.

Every time he thinks he’s flagging, that he can’t go any further, Hashirama heals him again and put him back to work.

(Why had he thought learning things from his brother was a good idea? Natural prodigies never understand how much more difficult things can be for everyone else!)

At least Hashirama will sometimes agree to let Tobirama pleasure him instead, if Tobirama begs very nicely for the privilege. It’s entirely worth it to beg if it gets him some relief.

By the time they get to part four (five? six? he’s lost count), which involves the application of toys, Tobirama has already decided that he regrets all of his life choices and this one especially.

It’s been _hours_.

He’s going to _die_.

He can’t even talk anymore, trying to convey his pleas for mercy in his eyes.

“You’ve been doing so good,” Hashirama says, putting his hand on the back of Tobirama’s neck the way he does sometimes when he’s feeling particularly proud. “You’re such a good boy, Tobirama, doing what I’m asking of you even when it hurts; I love you so much.”

Tobirama can’t help but preen a little at that. His brother _loves_ him.

So what if the way he choose to express that love is different from other brothers?

“I bet you’re getting a little tired now, aren’t you?”

Tobirama nods furiously.

“Well, all right. But I don’t want to leave you with any gaps in your education –”

Tobirama’s a completionist at heart, so he doesn’t like the idea either; the gaps will gnaw on his mind and disturb his sleep in the future as he gets curious as to what was left out.

But right now, _he’ll take it_.

“– so how about we do this: you agree to use some of these toys every time you practice touching yourself for the next few months or so, until you’ve trained yourself to like having something inside of you when you come, and in return we can stop the lesson now. How about that?”

Hashirama is the _best_ brother, taking pity on him like that, and Tobirama expresses his relief by throwing his arms around him for a (rather uncharacteristic) hug.

Hashirama laughs and hugs him back. “It’s gotten late,” he observes, nodding out the window. “Come, let’s wash up and go to sleep.”

Tobirama can’t really walk right now, so Hashirama ends up lifting him up, arm under his neck and another under his legs like he’s an infant, to take him into the bath, and then gently washing him clean before quickly bathing himself.

The water, Tobirama’s element, is wonderfully soothing, and Hashirama’s iryo jutsu is, too. By the time they make it back to bed, Hashirama curling himself up around Tobirama like a many-armed monkey clutching onto a beloved tree the way he always does, Tobirama’s already more than halfway asleep, and he drifts off quite happily, already planning on sleeping in as late as he can allow himself the next morning.

But water _is_ his element.

It’s almost entirely dark when he wakes up, the light of the moon barely enough to let him make out dull, rough shapes in the dark, and he can taste something wrong with the water.

Salt.

Tobirama visited the ocean once, as a child. It’s far too long a journey to make without good reason, particularly with the Uchiha lands sitting firmly in between them and the closer of the coasts, but Hashirama had insisted on it for Tobirama’s fifth birthday – it’d been right after he’d crawled back home after a courier mission gone horribly wrong, the Uchiha child-killing bands out to avenge the death of their clan head’s eldest son, and they’d carved a mark of shame into his shoulder that to this day served as a constant, terrible reminder of the dishonorable means he’d used to escape, targeting their eyes like a bandit, and no matter that it was an accident.

(He remembers that time all too well.

He’d been so desperate: they’d been having fun with him, kicking him back and forth, stepping on his hands, forcing his face into the dirt. It’d been funny to them, that the Senju had whelped such a runt as he, all pale-faced and red-eyed – like a rat, they’d laughed, like a corpse, diseased and hideous, and they’d made jokes about who his true parentage must have been for him to turn out like that.

He’d remembered the only suiton lesson he’d ever had: water-summoning, the most basic of the basic, and he knew it wouldn’t do any good against a whole band of adult Uchiha child-killers, but he couldn’t let himself die. Not at age four, not on a stupid courier mission that was supposed to be a nice and easy run to get him used to going out all on his own.

There wasn’t any water around to summon, though, but he’d remembered what his teacher, a passing Uzumaki come for a brief visit, had told him – _there’s an ocean in every one of us_ , he’d said, _no matter where we go, no matter what, we carry the salt of the ocean in our blood_ – and there was plenty of blood, all over Tobirama’s chest and from his nose, and he’d gotten it smeared on the Uchiha’s clothing so he’d thought that maybe it would be enough.

But when he called the water to come to him, not focusing just calling for any water, any water at all, it hadn’t come from the blood on their clothing: it had burst out of their eyes in a shower of viscera so vile that the memory still sometimes wakes him up in the middle of the night and sends him to scrub off his skin as if the stain of it had never left him. They’d been moaning, blinded, in pain, and he’d crawled away, one of his legs twisted the wrong way round from one of their kicks and his ribs feeling like they’d splintered in his chest. They tried to give chase, of course, even unseeing as they now were, but they couldn’t track him without their eyes and he’d gotten away. That’d been what he’d wanted, yes, but the shame of it still burned.

It’d been the middle of winter, he remembers, and Hashirama had been the one to find him: he’d made it most of the way home before the pain and the terror and the exhaustion had overcome him, so he’d ended up crawling into a hollow at the base of a birch tree in a vain attempt to hide his too-pale hair against the ghostly white bark.

His lips had been nearly blue when he’d been found, the trees sleepily calling out Hashirama’s name until he responded despite all the warnings he’d been given not to listen to them too much; Tobirama’s armor had been stolen and his clothing ripped all to shreds, first by the Uchiha’s knives as they laughingly cut stripes into his flesh to watch him thrash as he tried to escape and then by their reaching grasping fingers as they lashed out blindly in agony with what was left of their prized dojutsu streaming down their cheeks in a stream of gore, so he’d had no defense as the cold earth leeched away his warmth.

Hashirama had scooped him into his arms and run home, his face gone nearly as pale as Tobirama’s skin; he’d been struck mute by his horror at the incident, reduced to furiously shaking his head as he refused to leave Tobirama’s side while the medics stitched up his wounds and settled him into a bath of lukewarm water that felt like it was burning, with Hashirama sitting behind him to keep him from slipping into the water to drown.

When Bustuma recounts the incident, as he sometimes did to guests who needed to be convinced to join the Senju side against the vicious Uchiha threat, he says that Hashirama didn’t say a single word the entire day, but Tobirama remembers otherwise, in that half-hazy dreamlike way of both exhaustion and childhood.

He remembers Hashirama, sitting with him in the bath, his white-knuckled fingers wrapped around Tobirama’s arms so tightly that they left bruises. He remembers Hashirama looking out the window at the forest that surrounded the Senju compound.

He remembers Hashirama saying, in a strange low whisper, “The trees were right.”

He still doesn’t know what Hashirama had meant by that.)

And after that, Hashirama had demanded they visit the ocean, so that Tobirama could learn his suiton from the mother of all rivers and become stronger, and Tobirama remembers very well his confusion when they’d first arrived and he’d first tasted the salt in the water in the air.

He tastes the same thing now, but there’s no ocean to blame.

He opens his eyes, but he can’t clearly make out Hashirama’s face, not even as close as it is.

“Anija?” he says hesitantly, his voice still rough from the exertions of the day before. “Are you – are you _crying_?”

He’d hoped that Hashirama was asleep, maybe having some sort of bad dream, but Hashirama’s hand comes up to settle in Tobirama’s hair, and he begins to run his hand through it.

“My brother,” he whispers, and his voice is choked up as if he has swallowed too many of his tears. “My little brother.”

“What’s wrong, anija?” Tobirama asks, alarmed. “What’s the matter?”

“I love you so much, Tobirama,” Hashirama says. “I love you _so much_. I can’t imagine life without you by my side. The thought of you growing away from me as you get older – I hate it.”

“I won’t go away,” Tobirama assures him. “I won’t, not ever.”

Hashirama laughs a little, but it’s not as happy as it normally is. “I know,” he says. “I know, because I’ll make sure of it.”

“Well, that’s good, then, isn’t it?”

“I’ll make sure of it,” Hashirama says again. He’s not really listening to Tobirama. “I’ll do terrible things, Tobirama; to you and to the world, whatever I have to. I want you to be happy, I do, I swear I do, but I want you with me _more_. And for that I’ll break every rule, violate every principle...”

“Anija, you’re being ridiculous,” Tobirama says, a little sharply. He doesn’t like this strange and twisted tone in his brother’s normally happy voice. “Being with you _is_ what makes me happy. Stop fretting over nothing.”

Hashirama laughs again, a strange creaky thing, and pulls him in even closer, until Tobirama’s head is resting on Hashirama’s chest. “Do you know, Tobirama, that you can shape trees?”

Tobirama blinks, surprised by the sudden change in subject. “Shape trees? You mean wood-cutting?”

“No, no. Living trees. See, if you get to them while they’re still young and tender, and you bind their branches in the way that you most like, their growth will be twisted into just that shape.”

“Oh. You mean like what cousin Taichiro did to make sure that tree by his house would grow over the wall instead of over his house?”

“Just like that. The trees don’t even realize they weren’t originally designed to grow that way; they settle into the new shape as if it was natural to them.”

Tobirama wonders if this is a Mokuton thing, like Hashirama’s bizarre hatred for lawns. Why in the world would he care if trees didn’t grow naturally the way they would out in the forest? And even if he did, surely it wasn’t something so distressing as to keep him up at night?

“Does it matter?” he finally asks, utterly baffled by this entire conversation. “If they don’t notice their new shape, and it works better for everyone if they grow that way, then surely it’s for the best all around?”

After all, cousin Taichiro was entirely reasonable in not wanting a branch to fall onto his roof the next time there was a particularly violent thunderstorm, whereas his garden wall could handle such a thing just fine.

“Mmm. An excellent point, I suppose. A tree doesn’t grow just for itself, after all, but is itself just a part of the growing forest – even if the other individual trees in the forest don’t always appreciate the way the forest is growing the new trees. But after all, any gardener will tell you that you need to clear out the weeds to let the trees grow unimpeded...”

Right. Hashirama is _clearly_ talking in his sleep. Forests aren’t gardeners: they’re just collections of trees. Not to mention the only person who thinks trees have any sort of thoughts is Hashirama, ever since he started ignoring all the elders’ advice and started listening to them ever more deeply...and how did he suddenly jump from trees to weeds, anyhow?

“Anija, you’re speaking nonsense,” Tobirama tells him, taking a firm tone designed to quiet dissent. “Just go to sleep and you’ll feel better in the morning. You must have stepped on a shadow to have such bad dreams for no reason.”

Hashirama chuckles, but it’s a good sound this time: he sounds amused and happy once again.

“All right, Tobirama. I’ll do as you say.” He leans forward and presses his lips against Tobirama’s forehead. “I hope you liked your lesson today.”

Tobirama considers for a moment. It’d been pleasurable and painful and wonderful and terrible; he’s not sure ‘liked’ is really the appropriate word to describe it. But he’s also learned so much about himself and his body, things he’ll be able to use in the future – he has no doubt that Hashirama’s going to start nagging him to practice these new skills more often, just the way he’s always nagging about practicing non-training activities so that Tobirama doesn’t forget how to have fun – and that’s not bad, too, since out of all the ways to make Hashirama pleased with him, this one seems particularly easy, even pleasurable.

No, all around, while Tobirama might not say that he _liked_ it, he can’t say that he didn’t benefit from it. Although...

“Anija,” he finally says. “One request.”

“Hmm?”

“If you ever start thinking that I need to learn about sex...”

“Yes?”

“ _Get somebody else to teach me_.”

Hashirama burst out laughing: real, proper happy laughter, giggles escalating to deep belly laughs. “Okay,” he says, using the front of Tobirama’s yukata to wipe the tears of laughter from his eyes. “Okay, Tobirama, I’ll keep that in mind. I’ll find the _perfect_ person for you, just you wait...did I overdo it today?”

“ _Yes_. I’m going to have _nightmares_ , anija.” But Tobirama is smiling. “Now go to sleep, and we’ll both forget this conversation ever happened by morning.”

“Yes, Tobirama. Whatever you say. Good night.”

Tobirama has no intention of actually putting this bizarre conversation out of his mind, of course, planning to analyze it in the morning when he is less tired. But as it happens, the very next day Hashirama ends up killing an elder for what appears to be no reason at all, right in the middle of the man’s punishment of Tobirama for some unspecified act of vile seductive licentiousness which Tobirama didn’t really understand and still doesn’t because he’s never successfully seduced anyone ever, not even for a mission, but of course submitted obediently to anyway, and everything gets very busy for a while as Tobirama has to run all levels of interference while Hashirama buries the body to hide what he’d done, so ultimately he really does forget all about it.

Hashirama ends up growing a surprisingly hearty and unusually beautiful rose garden on top of the hidden grave, and wins three awards in that year’s regional competition for most beautiful flowers.

Tobirama would try to make some sort of meaning out of that, but he’s never been good at metaphors.


End file.
